Text Book of Materia Medica.
By Adolph Lippe, M. D.
Professor of Materia Medica at the Homœopathic
College of Pennsylvania.
Presented by Médi-T.
PREFACE.
This
work was originally prepared for the use of those attending the Lectures
on the Materia Medica, in the Homœopathic Medical College of
Pennsylvania, and at their request.It contains the characteristic
and most prominent special symptoms
of the best proved and most used of our Medicines.The distinction of symptoms, as the result of
provings on the healthy (pathogenetic), or as the result of clinical
observations on the sick (curative), or as belonging to both these
classes, has not been retained in this work. Such distinctions belong
exclusively to the complete Materia Medica, the study of which the
present Text-book is intended to facilitate, not to supersede. And to a
more thorough and satisfactory study and knowledge of Materia Medica
than has been general of late years, it in sincerely hoped that this
book may prove both an introduction and a guide.So great is the multiplicity of symptoms (the result
of provings, clinical corroborations and observations, with which our
growing Materia Medica is overladen, that it seems little less than an
impossibility to obtain a clear discriminating view of each separate
remedy.The efforts previously made to overcome this
difficulty, by abridging the Materia Medica, have proved but failures.
Nor was it possible for them to have resulted otherwise, since they did
not exhibit the essentially characteristic symptoms of the different
medicines. They were attempts at mechanical sifting, weeding out, made
without proper comprehension of the subject ; which disappointed
those who referred to them, and led them to demand a differently
prepared and more reliable guide.It is with the greatest reluctance that I have
yielded to the requests of my professional friends and of those whom I
have the pleasure of instructing, and endeavored to meet this demand. An
only those who have undertaken such a work can truly realize its arduous
nature, so no one can be more thoroughly conscious of its imperfections
than is the author himself.Those who have mastered the Materia Medica, the
author is well aware, may be acquainted with characteristic symptoms
unknown to him or overlooked by him ; and he will thankfully
receive and acknowledge such supplementary, characteristic and especial
symptoms, for incorporation in the present work.
In
presenting this Text-book to his colleagues, the author relies as well
upon the intelligence as upon the charity of those most conversant with
the subject ; since while they will undoubtedly notice many
omissions and much room for improvement, they will, at the same time,
appreciate the formidable nature of the task which he has been induced
to undertake.The method and object of the work are different from
those of any before published on the Homœopathic Materia Medica ;
but its arrangement is simple, varying but little from that originally
adopted by Hahnemann.The first symptoms given axe those of the mind ;
followed by those of the different parts of the body, beginning with the
head, -which also includes giddiness,- and concluding with the feet.
Then come the generalities, comprising the symptoms relating to the Nervous
Systems and to the Circulation ;
these belonging to Sleep, Fever
and the Skin ; and finally, the
most prominent conditions of Aggravation
and Amelioration, from time, place
and circumstance.The usefulness of this book can only he determined by
the practical test, to which it is respectfully submitted by THE AUTHOR.PHILADELPHIA, December 30th, 1865.
Copyright
© Médi-T 2006