The Life and Letters of Dr Samuel Hahnemann By Thomas Lindsley Bradford, M.D. Presented by Dr Robert Séror

The Life and Letters
of Dr Samuel Hahnemann
By Thomas Lindsley Bradford,
M.D.
Presented by Dr Robert Séror

Chapter 28.

Literary work
Editions of the “

Organon”
Founding of the “Archiv”
Prefaces to the “Materia
Medica Pura”

Literary work

Hahnemann

now
devoted himself to literary work, especially to the elaboration of that
great monument to his genius, “The
Chronic Diseases.”
With the exception of a number of pamphlets and short articles, this is
the only original work that he published after this time.

While living in

Coethen
he published the 3rd, 4th and 5th editions of the ” Organon
” and the 2nd and 3rd editions of the ” Materia
Medica Pura.”

As has been mentioned, the first edition of the ”

Organon”
was published in 1810, while Hahnemann
was living at Torgau.
It is not as large as the later editions, nor does it contain as many
notes.

Hahnemann

first
mentions the word Homoeopathy
in the Organon
; it is composed of two words from the Greek omoios, similar, and pathos,
disease. He also used the word Allopath to designate the members of the
dominant school of medicine.

Editions of the “

Organon
”

The growth of the doctrines of Homoeopathy can very plainly be traced
in the mind of its discoverer in the different editions. In them all the
arguments are, consistent and any anomalies are easily explainable. The
third edition was issued in 1824 ; the fourth in 1829 ; the fifth in 1833,
ail by

Arnold
of Dresden.

In 1824 Baron von

Brunnow
translated it into French. His edition was published in Dresden.
Of it Hahnemann
says in the preface to the third edition : (Dudgeon’s
translation of the “Organon,” 1893.)

” A great help to the spread of the good cause in foreign lands is
won by the good French translation of the last edition, recently brought
out at great sacrifice by that genuine philanthropist, my learned friend
Baron von

Brunnow.”

But five editions of the “

Organon”
were issued during the lifetime of the master. He left the notes for a
sixth edition at his death, which as yet has never been published.

Dr.
Arthur

Lutze,
in 1865, issued an unauthorized edition that we repudiated by the
profession. An account of this and of the unpublished “Organon”
is given in the chapter devoted to Madame Hahnemann.

In the

Allgemeine
Anzeiger der Deutschen,
1819, Hahnemann
published a short article on “Uncharitableness
Towards Suicides.”
He mentions the epidemic prevalence of suicide, maintains that it is a
form of insanity and says : (Lesser
Writings,” New York, p. 695.)

“This most unnatural of all human purposes, this disorder of the
mind that renders them weary, of life, might always be with certainty
cured if the medicinal powers of pure

gold
for the cure of this sad condition were known. The smallest dose of
pulverized gold attenuated to the billionth degree, or the smallest part
of a drop of an equally diluted solution of pure gold,
which may be mixed in his drink without his knowledge, immediately and
permanently removes this fearful state of the (body and) mind, and the
unfortunate being is saved.”

The Homoeopathic practitioner knows that this advice is as true at the
present day as when

Hahnemann
gave it.

Founding of the “

Archiv”

In 1821 Dr. Ernst

Stapf
established at Leipsic
a journal devoted to the spread of Homoeopathy, which was issued three
times a year. It was called “Archiv
fur die Homoopathische Heilkunst
” (Archives
for Homoeopathie Healing).

This was the first magazine ever published in the interests of
Homoeopathy. And now the followers of the Master had an organ in which to
present their truths to the world. On the reverse of the title of each
number, and facing the index, is the following quotation from

Shakespeare’s
“Romeo and Juliet,”
act 1, scene 2 :

“Tut, man, one fire burns out another’s burning ;
One pain is lessened by another’s anguish ;
Turn giddy and be holp by backward turning ;
One desperate grief cures with another’s languish.
Take thou some new infection to the eye,
And the rank poison of the old will die.”

The
initial number of this journal was issued in September, 1821. The first
article was from the pen of

Moritz
Muller on
“The Critical Examination of Homoeopathy.”

Stapf

published an
essay upon Homoeopathy, some cases, some aphorisms, a review of the sixth
volume of the “Materia
Medica Pura,” and,
in connection with Gross,
certain provings of Platina.

At this time, besides the immediate pupils – the members of the first
Provers Union – there were a number of recent converts to Homoeopathy who
were in independent practice of that system.

Among them

Gross
was at Juterbogk
; Moritz Muller
and Carl Haubold
were settled in Leipsic,
as well as the veterinary surgeon Wilhelm Lux,
who was to astonish the world with the remarkable nature of Isopathy.

Drs.
C. F.

Trinks
and Paul Wolf
were at Dresden.
As early as 1819 Dr. Gossner
had practiced Homoeopathy in Oberhollabrun
in Lower Austria and Dr. Mussek
in Seefeld,
a neighboring town.

In Prague Dr.

Marenzeller,
military staff surgeon and attending physician to his Imperial Highness,
the Archduke John,
was becoming interested in the new system.

In

Vienna, Veith
was testing its virtues.

Dr.

Adam,
who had met Hahnemann,
was introducing it into Russia. In 1821 the Austrian, Baron Francis Koller,
had carried the “Organon”
to Naples,
where a translation had been made under the auspices of the Royal Academy,
and where, in 1822, Dr. George Necker,
a pupil of Hahnemann,
also settled and soon opened a dispensary for the poor.

In the meantime, in

Coethen,
Hahnemann
was taking walks in his little garden, long drives into the surrounding
country, writing letters to his many friends and followers, pondering over
his new doctrines, and preparing for the press the second edition of the
” Materia Medica
Pura.”

It does not seem that

Hahnemann
took any particular pains to assist his pupils before he left Leipsic
or after he settled at Coethen.
Kleinert
says : (Geschichte der
Homöopathie,” p. 107. Med. Counsellor, vol. XI, p. 270.)

” That Homoeopathy assumed defined shape and developed strength to
live and to overcome obstacles is much more the result of their (the
students and disciples) labors than that of

Hahnemann.
There is no doubt at all that at the beginning of the second decade of
this century the tenacity of Hahnemann
was commencing to yield to advancing years and that he had long ceased to
enjoy the thickest of the battle.

With his then strong inclination to dictate, and his more or less
unwise tendency to isolate himself, there would have resulted a standstill
or a retrograde movement which would have lasted for at least one
generation if the tact, zeal and ability of these men had not made
themselves felt everywhere.

“In spite of every species of adversity, not unfrequently
proceeding from the master himself, they stood like beacon-lights of
fidelity, and, when it became necessary, distinguished between the
precious doctrine and its prophet, between the jewel itself and the
setting.

“It is impossible to find a single statement in print, or an
authenticated verbal statement, to show that

Hahnemann,
who was now blessed with a most profitable practice, ever spent upon his
followers more than the spirit of his doctrine, although he well knew
their great perplexities and fully understood their academic afflictions
increased in proportion to their faithfulness to him.

He left to their own fate two of his favorite disciples when they were
on trial for illegally practicing, although in this case neither his
position, living nor fortune, but only his honor, was involved. He, well
knew the schemes, plans, and doings of his opponents. We find his defence
prepared by his pupils, in most cases they were not even indorsed or
seconded by him, but, on the contrary, were received with contempt,
suspicions and ridicule ; he never took a hand in them !”

It would seem that

Kleinert,
and also Hartmann,
thought that Hahnemann
should have acted in a much different manner towards them. That his one
aim was first and always the advancement of Homoeopathy, no one who will
carefully read his writings can deny. And that by allowing his
followers to fight their battles for themselves he made them more bold,
attracted the attention of the world more fully to the new system, and
caused it to more quickly spread, is now seen to be true.

And, too, he naturally thought that his pupils were the proper persons
to continue the fight that he had maintained singly for so many years.

Hahnemann

took a
great interest in the Archiv
der Heilkunst from
the first. In a letter to Stapf,
written in 1826, he says : (Hom.
World, vol. XXIV, p. 361.)

“I still continue to read works on other scientific subjects, but
nothing medical except your

Archiv.

I have not read even

Hufelands
Journal for
years, and, in my present isolation and severance from well-informed
physicians, I do not know where to get the loan of the number of Hufelands
Journal you refer
me to.

I am delighted to receive the important information that the leader of
all writers of complicated prescriptions, and of the most material
pathology of the ordinary stamp, has again bestowed a friendly glance on
his antipode, who has in his writings indicated him as the champion of
antiquated medical nonsense, and mentioned him alone by name (in the
“

Sources of the
ordinary Materia Medica”
at the beginning of the third volume of the “Materia
Medica Pura”).

You would confer a favor on me if, when opportunity offers, would make
a short extract from his favorable judgment.

I am pleased with

Gross’s
refutation of the Anti-Organon.
Gross,
in my opinion, is growing more valiant. My only regret is that he has
spent so much time and thought over that piece of sophistry.

”
Believe me, all this senseless fighting against the manifest truth only
exhausts the poor creatures, and does not stay its progress, and we would
do well to allow such trashy, spiteful lucubrations to pass unnoticed ;
they will without aid sink into the abyss of oblivion and into their
merited nothingness.

“I fear more the empirical contaminations of that society of
half-Homoeopaths about which you write, which they had sufficient prudence
not to invite me to join, but of whose doings I have been pretty correctly
informed by oral communications.

I fear that inaccuracy and rashness will preside over their
deliberations, and I would earnestly beg of you to do what you can to
check and restrain them.

For should our art once lose its attribute of the most conscientious
exactness, which must happen if the

dii
minorurn gentium seek
to push themselves into notoriety by their so-called observations, then I
tremble for the raising of our art out of the dust ; then we shall lose
all certainty, which is of great importance to us.

” Therefore, I beg you will keep out of your

Archiv
all superficial
observations of pretended successful treatment. Admit only truthful,
accurate, careful records of cases from the practice of accredited
Homoeopaths ; these must be models of good

Homoeopathic art. In spite of all precautions, some of these recorded
cases of chronic maladies will incur suspicion that they may not be
permanent, when the eyes of medical men shall be opened on the subject of
the cure of chronic diseases by my book, which, after ten years labor, is
not yet ready, but is gradually approaching completion.

“Yours very truly,

“Sam. Hahnemann.

“Coethen, March 13, 1826.”

And again :

(Hom.
World, vol. XXV, p. 113.)

”
I thank you for the third number of the eighth volume of your Archiv.
It has pleased me
very much, and I can find nothing censurable in it. We must endeavor to
maintain its old value, so that it shall remain unsurpassed in the
estimation of the medical public.

Gross, Rummel

, and
also, Aegidi and
Hartmann have acquitted
themselves well. I will soon make a search to see if I have any
presentable provings of medicines.”

In 1825

Hahnemann
published in the Allgemeine
Anzeiger an
answer to an article that had been published in the same journal entitled
:

” Information for the Truth Seeker in No. 165 of the Allgemeine
Anzeiger der Deutschen.”

This essay was published in 1827 as an introduction to Volume VI. of
the second edition of the ”

Materia
Medica Pura” under
the title : (“Lesser Writings,” New York.)

” How can small doses of such very attenuated, medicines as
homoeopathy employs still possess great power ?”

Prefaces to the “

Materia
Medica Pura”

In a preface to the fourth volume of the second edition of the “

Materia
Medica Pura,”
1825, was published an article : ” Eine
Erinnerung,” to
which Dudgeon
gives the title : ”
Contrast of the Old and New Systems of Medicine.”

In this

Hahnemann
speaks of the fallacy of prescribing according to a nosological and
capricious name for disease, and the ease of prescribing from a
prescription pocket-book.

He says :

“But how did the prescriptions for these names of diseases
originate ?

Were they communicated by some divine revelation ? My dear Sir, they
are either formulas prescribed by some celebrated practitioner for some
case or other of disease to which he has arbitrarily given this
nosological name, which formulas consist of a variety of ingredients known
to him no doubt by name, that came into his head and were put by him into
an elegant form by the aid of that important art which is called

the
art of prescribing, whereby
the requirements of chemical skill and pharmaceutical observance were
attended to, if not the welfare of the patient ; one or several receipts
of this kind for the given case, under the use of which the patient at
least did not die, but, thanks to heaven and his good constitution ! –
gradually recovered.

“After three and twenty centuries of such criminal mode of
procedure, now that the whole human race seems to be awaking in order
powerfully to vindicate its rights, shall not the day begin to dawn for
the deliverance of suffering humanity which has hitherto been racked with
diseases, and in addition tortured with medicines administered without
rhyme or reason, and without limit as to number and quantity, for phantoms
of diseases, in conformity with the wildest notions of physicians proud of
the antiquity of their sect ?

“Shall the pernicious jugglery of routine treatment still continue
to exist ?

“Shall the entreaty of the patient to listen to the account of his
sufferings, vainly resound through the air unheard by his brethren of
mankind, without exciting the helpful attention of the human heart”.

Hahnemann

then shows
the simpler, more certain method of healing in accordance with the
Homoeopathic system, and in conclusion says :

” Do old antiquated untruths become anything better – do they
become truths – by reason of their hoary antiquity ?

Is not truth eternal, though it may have been discovered only an hour
ago ?

Does the novelty of its discovery render it an untruth ?

Was there ever a discover or a truth that was not at first novel
?”

In the same volume (IV, second edition) is an article called “

The
Medical Observer.”

It shows the importance of the most careful observations of the patient
on the part of the physician, with the proper means to be adopted to
become a careful observer of disease.

(“Lesser
Writings,” New York.)

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