two sections; first, observations by pupils of Hahnemann, of whom twenty-one are mentioned, namely:

The total of 568 symptoms resulting from an addition of the above sums is evidently too large, because there is often more than one authority for the same symptoms; one could hardly say off hand that 148 symptoms are all that remain to be considered under this second group, and yet one would not be far wrong in saying so.

It is only after a more exact observation of these symptoms that we find the welcome possibility of constructing a history of the proving out of the reports of several cases, because in a sufficient number of each prover's symptoms, we have a statement of the time when they

arose.

(To be continued.)

ON THE SIFTING OF MEDICINAL SYMPTOMS. By Dr. CONSTANTIN HERING, of Philadelphia.*

AFTER some humorous remarks on the conduct of the Austrian police in excluding all plants of the mushroom tribe that have a red top from the market for fear of confounding the red topped edible fungi with the poisonous ones, he goes on to say

It is just the same with the Hahnemann Materia Medica, but what in Austria is the police is here called "criticism." "We ought," so say our police, " rather to let our patients remain uncured than cure them by means of symptoms, among which, perhaps, some may be false;" because these symptoms are derived from provers whom they are pleased to suspect, or from provers not in perfect health. The police allow no mushrooms with red tops, and the critics no symptoms from sick persons, no symptoms from timorous doses, no symptoms from high potencies, &c. The police say, "They have red caps, they may be poisonous-away with them, we are no connoisseurs !" Our critics go further, they say, even not only they may be false, but "they are false." Obviously, the critics might learn something from the police, and say, they might or could be, and possibly are false, and more from caution let us sweep out all resembling them. Many of our critics go a step farther still. They say, not only these symptoms are all one with another worthless; no! they hold them like a kind of scabby sheep, and think that by means of these bad symptoms the good ones even may be infected. This reminds us of the tooth breakers of last century, who humbugged people into the belief that the black teeth must come out or they would infect the white ones. So here it is wished to pull out the carious symptoms in order that the others

nay stand firmer. Truly it needed the experience of many

* From the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, vol. lxxi, p. 73.

thousand mal-treated persons to teach that thereby the whole set of masticators were made shaky—that this frightful delusion has got into the best heads like mould in the brain, and probably spreads further like such fungoid germs floating in the air as example may show.

In a quarto volume commenced in 1852, says a much respected arranger of the provings of Kali bichromicum, p. 4, in a note-" In selecting the groups of symptoms which compose the following schema, I have subjected the narratives of the experimenters to what may appear somewhat rigid criticism; and in the fear of incorporating any useless or doubtful symptoms may have left out many that really belong to the drug and which may turn out to be valuable. But I hold that it is better to reject many real symptoms than admit one false one, as one false symptom tends to vitiate* the whole by destroying our confidence in the rest."

Truly we must be thankful that any one should have the courage boldly to write out such fearful nonsense in the face of the world. We learn thereby things we should not have ventured to think possible. So actually there are people, physicians, homœopathists, who have "confidence" in the symptoms of the Materia Medica, and what a confidence! A confidence in the hundreds or thousands of symptoms of the different medicines, more delicate than the sugar figures on an almond tart- -a shake and down it goes! "One false symptom destroys the whole." What is a false symptom? As yet there is not one single, among the many thousand, which may be held positively and certainly false; as yet this has been demonstrated according to the strict rules of science in no single one; hitherto there has been only suspicion thrown on them, it has been made probable-very probable, that some are false, but as yet there is no proof! There are doubtless many "false" symptoms in all probability, that it can be otherwise is not reasonably to be expected; hence that is all that the old

[Dr. Hering translates "tends to vitiate the whole" by the German words "richtet das Gauze zu Grunde." This means literally "destroys the whole," which is not an accurate rendering of the English expression.-EDS.]

school could say against this greatest problem of the century, viz., to throw suspicion over the whole thing. Now come such followers of our opponents and think if they can make suspicious some individual symptoms-for a proof that suspicion is well grounded has not yet been given in one single case those must not only be flung away immediately, but even the good and true ones along with them; as if when one of the servants of a household becomes suspected, we must hang the whole of them, for the sugar figure of confidence is snapped in two. In such a way they think to rescue science and pave the way for truth! For, in reality, how do we ever ascertain that any symptom of any medicine really and truly belongs to it? There must be ways and means, though through them even the most conscientious, the most careful, and the most attentive observer may possibly err, for he is human, and to err is human. That this same is possible and to be expected is plain from the words of the above critic himself. For not without sympathy we read that he confesses himself that it is possible in his rigid zeal for the rescue of purity, he may have "left out many symptoms" which "really belong to the medicine," and he is willing to admit that these, in the course of time " may be proved to be true." But how are those unlucky symptoms to manage to prove themselves true, when they have been flung overboard in the arrangements of the symptoms? There is only one way by which we can from time to time make individual symptoms more probable, and by this way many can gradually be found worthy; but this is only possible when you don't begin by flinging it overboard into the maw of the devouring sharks of criticism. This way is, however, that of the most strict method, the method of Hahnemann, who artistically resolved the great problem in this same manner half a century before Apelt wrote his theory of induction. In this way

we must advance further, and develop in the manner of all sound growth, and we shall arrive at the goal set before us by Hahnemann, viz., mathematical certainty. To this belong-1st. Provings on the healthy with or without poisonings. 2nd. Observations on the sick. 3rd. Cures

of groups of symptoms. 4th. Placing together all these symptoms in all their relations. 5th. Comparison of the symptoms of each medicine among themselves. The last, the chief thing, the determining of the singularities and the thereon founded sifting, separating, and appreciating, &c., and in the field of art, the determining the choice of a remedy;-in the field of science, the pillars and arches-all that is flatly impossible without the previous placing together of all the symptoms, without the most complete collections. These must be in the hands of all, or at least may be, in order that individual "prominent" symptoms may not through prejudice, confuse and darken the eyes of the many who should see for themselves, neither through learned clouds of dust from quartos or folios, nor whirlwinds of sand. We must have our whole medicinal treasury before us, accessible to all, and specially as was proposed by me in two forms-1st, in monographs, historic and genetic, as the groundwork of the science; and 2nd, the pure symptomatology in the encyclopædic form as the groundwork of the art. All our contentions don't bring us forward one step, and lead us after our thirty years' war at the most to a Westphalian peace, i. e., to a greater degree of dismemberment. The three editions of the Organon will certainly not help to unite us, but the above two collections of the Materia Medica would at least render sound criticism possible. For the completion of the two towers of the Cologne Cathedral each ticket costs a dollar, and it is hoped to finish them both at once. For the building of our two towers the cost of any part is five dollars. That is truly a difference; but in the former case a building is only completed; in the latter, a new one is begun. But while there, one may perhaps get some good, here he will surely get his point. To contribute to, is not to adopt a plan; and here each can contribute, because he wishes to see a thing done and given to the world. But, perhaps, this even is to ask too much; then we must wait patiently till the world wants it.