HOMEOPATHY AS A SCIENCE. 739 



disease, so is the constitution to the condition of the patient when the 

 disease shall have left it. Convalescence in homoeopathy commences 

 when the correct remedy begins to act. In allopathy, when the rem- 

 edy and disease have left the patient prostrate, then Nature takes the 

 matter in hand. It is a common error with the ignorant traducers of 

 homoeopathy that the higher the potencies or its remedies the weaker 

 they become, as one weakens wine by adding water. It is sufficient 

 answer to quote the following high authority, who discloses the true 

 purpose and effect : 



" If it be conceded that the vital principle is identical with elec- 

 tricity, the action of dynamized medicaments becomes easy of compre- 

 hension ; for in these preparations we have material substances sub- 

 divided to a degree that enables them to penetrate the most delicate 

 tissues of the body." (Dr. Currie's preface to Jahr's " Homoeopathic 

 Manual.") 



The writer's assertion, that " homoeopathy, being a system utterly 

 void of any scientific foundation, is now dying a natural death," re- 

 ceives, to say the least, doubtful support from the animated debate 

 which has been progressing so vigorously in the New York County 

 Medical Society of the regular school in reference to consultation with 

 homoeopaths, where the exclusionists accused the more liberal brothers 

 of having an itching palm for the fat fees which now find their way, 

 without chance of tax, to the pockets of the homoeopathic physicians, 

 while the argument by the liberal members is that as now homoeopathy 

 has progressed and its disciples have a thorough medical education, 

 there is no longer any reason why they should be treated as quacks 

 and impostors. So far as noted, the alleged moribund condition of 

 homoeopathy had escaped their observation. 



What shall be said of the pretensions to be enrolled with the 

 sciences of that school which has progressed from one stage of uni- 

 versal disease or cause and remedy to another typhoid, malaria, 

 miasm germ, bleeding, calomel, morphine, quinine by discarding 

 nearly all that its pioneers held most dear ; which, before it can 

 build, must tear down ; which retreats from the necessary labor of 

 that scientific investigation which by great diligence and skill elimi- 

 nates every remedy but one as useless or hurtful, to take refuge in 

 a nauseous mixture of several powerful drugs, administered upon the 

 hit or miss blunderbuss principle those drugs which are neither 

 allopathic nor homoeopathic to the disease, doing more potent injury 

 than the one (which by hap-hazard has some relation) can do good, 

 as Sir John Forbes says, " the monstrous poly-pharmacy which has 

 always been the disgrace of our " (the allopathic) " art " ? 



It may well be doubted whether homoeopathy will ever have en- 

 rolled under its banners the same number of practitioners as the regular 

 school. The nearer we approach to an exact science, the fewer are its 

 votaries. The conditions admit fewer. In it there are no formulated 



