though we should say that they result, some of them from external causes (as all kinds of injuries and poisonings), and all others without exception from internal causes or predispositions, congenital or acquired, whose exterior agents are only the exciting causes of their manifestation; that these predispositions, defined by the characters as well as by the order of association and succession they impart to the morbid phenomena, are absolutely inexplicable by the known laws of physiology.

And we should have to reconcile this doctrine with that of Hahnemann which rests entirely on the negation of internal causes, and substitute for them an incomprehensible mythology of miasms and viruses, without perceiving that these imaginary miasms and viruses are morbid products, the effects of diseases, and that an effect cannot be a cause. What an extraordinary syncretism the appellation of homœopaths would impose on us!

5. We proclaim the following law as the basis of semiology and pathological anatomy.

Every morbid phenomenon, studied in itself, and in its relationships with the diseases in which it is observed, appears as though it were correct to say, that it receives from every disease a particular appreciable modification, and that in its turn, this modification could serve as a mark to enable us to judge of the species and the mode of termination of the disease,

Reconcile this with the declaration of Hahnemann: "That every case of disease is an isolated independent fact, a collection of various symptoms, the existence or non-existence of which, can never be supposed á priori by hypothesis, and that nothing fixed and determinate can be constructed on such an unstable foundation."

And with this: "Hence it follows that it is impossible to confer names on all the possible aggregations of symptoms, on all the morbid cases that we meet with."

In order then to be able to call ourselves homeopaths, we should have to assert that the theoretical and practical constitution of semiology and of pathological anatomy are the same thing, or the absolute radical negation of these two sciences. What a master-stroke in the art of syncretism.

6. In therapeutics we do not admit anything besides the medi

cine of indications; that is to say, for us there is no treatment without the motives which determine the physician's actions, which are called indications. In as far as Hahnemann's therapeutics can be brought into accord with the traditional and legitimate method, we accept his therapeutics, and place it in the first rank of the hierarchy in the medicine of indications.

But we are not bound to reject the methods of treatment founded exclusively on their acknowledged efficacy in certain diseases. Neither do we exclude the indications founded on the knowledge of the evident causes of certain morbid phenòmena, nor the indications thence logically and rationally deducible.

What we blame, is the confused employment of all these methods at once, because this syncretism, this confusion, is the negation of the medicine of indications, that is to say, of true eclecticism in therapeutics.

7. Lastly, we hold that the regimen ought to be adapted to the species of the disease, to the state of the patient, in place of being made exclusively subordinate to the nature of the medicine administered. On the other hand, it is evident that the regimen should be directed to the same aim as the medicine and that the effects of the one should not neutralize those of the other.

In order to call ourselves homœopaths, even in therapeutics, we should have to profess a systematic exclusivism, which we abhor, to renounce modes of treatment, whose great efficacy we must appreciate, to accept fixed rules for diet, common to all patients, which would be very dangerous; in a word, we should have to affirm that homeopathy includes all the medicine of indications, whereas it is included in the latter.

We have directed M. Simon's attention to all the sap-bearing roots of the medical tree. We can do no more for him. It is a law of nature, that the tree puts forth its new sprouts on the very place where it has been cut through.

What we have to do now, is to reply to M. Simon's well put sarcasms, to his defiances and to his insinuations. We have already treated the scientific question, and we might stop there; personalities such as M. Simon has had the good sense to confine himself to being perfectly legitimate, and such criticisms

being not destitute of use, for they let us know the imperfections both of ourselves and of our work. A few words will suffice.

In any point of view whatsoever, were we to accept the appellation of homeopaths, we should be subscribing to an evident error, or if the term is preferred, a confusion.

M. Simon wonders at our confidence and hope in eclecticism, and he has marked his astonishment by a point of exclamation. This proves that M. Leon Simon is absolutely ignorant of what eclecticism is, and we have no time to teach him. We refer him for instruction to the conferences of R. P. Ventura, on Catholic and philosophical reason, as also to the same theologian's essay on the origin of ideas, and the foundation of certainty.

He alleges that our school has not even offered the first outline of a body of doctrines. That strikes us as being rather severe. It seems to us that our Etudes de médecine générale, that our work on Medical Education in France, that an article on Dupuytren and the scientific constitution of surgery, our introduction of January 1855, that of January 1856, and a number of the essays of our collaborators, might have enabled a less intelligent man than M. Simon, to find lineaments sufficiently distinct to enable him to know our physiology, our pathology, and our therapeutics. As regards the primary truth which explains all the other principles we have proclaimed, it has made sufficient noise to reach even the inattentive ears of M. Simon. He knows that that doctrine of the unity of man resulting from the substantial union of soul and body, a doctrine formulised by Aristotle, admirably developed by St. Thomas, enunciated by the authority of the Church, is that primary truth that explains all the other principles we have proclaimed. M. Simon is not unaware of the war waged upon us by M. Cayol in consequence of this doctrine, to which he has since become a convert.

We are ready to acknowledge that we have only finished the first part of our studies of general medicine; it remains for us to expose false vitalism in the second part, and in the third, our own dogmatism. And this was commenced ten years ago, by a lecture delivered before the Institute, on the essentiality of diseases. Has M. Simon a right to complain of our dilatori

ness? We have sacrificed our own works to the verification and the defence of the therapeutical reform of Hahnemann: and and if (though it is an exaggeration to say so) allopathy fears homœopathy, is it exclusively to the eloquence of M. Simon that this result is to be attributed? Has our eclecticism been as powerless as his pretended purism? Let M. Simon make himself perfectly easy about our future. He knows how easily we remove obstacles that threaten to compromise us, and cast off useless burdens, in order to be able to dissipate his errors with regard to the Art Médical, and to be charitable enough to aid his weakness, a weakness, the amount which it is impossible for him to estimate.

But if we hold so cheaply what concerns us, we cannot treat so lightly what concerns others, and especially Hahnemann. We point out, and energetically repudiate his errors, and this imposes on us an anxiety all the more viligant, and a zeal all the more scrupulous to preserve the deposit of truths he has taught and bequeathed to the medical world. These truths now form a part of the domain of the medicine of indications; it is therefore our duty to rescue them from the injury likely to accrue to them from false or indiscreet friends. Unfortunately he has many such, side by side with some of the most honourable practitioners.

Our readers will now understand why, although we usually employ the therapeutic method of Hahnemann in the treatment of disease, we reject the appellation of homeopaths. We accept the truth established by Hahnemann, we reject the word, because this word has become in the mouths of the allopaths an obstacle to progress, and in that of the homœopaths an insult to tradition, and we are for both progress and tradition. Our eclecticism is comprised in one sole principle, that of the medicine of indications.

VOL. XIV, NO. LVIII.-OCTOBER, 1856.

2 U

REVIEWS.

The Monthly Homœopathic Review.
OZANNE, M.D.

Edited by JOHN

SUCH is the title of a new periodical, the first number of which appeared in July, and which has kept its appointed time in the subsequent months. The well established character of the editor for talent and integrity as well as his familiarity with the continental literature of homœopathy, will secure for his journal a favourable reception from our little public. We believe we shall best promote the welfare of this undertaking in which we take a deep interest, by enabling our readers to form their own judgment of its scope and design, as well as the style of its composition from its own lips.

"We look upon the law which is the foundation of homœopathic therapeutics as an incontrovertible truth. We moreover consider it to be a truth which in its application to the healing of disease, has been productive of inestimable benefits to mankind. Hence we feel that it is our duty, as well as that of all those who are convinced of its truth, to use every means in our power, to cause it to be fully and rightly known to all men.

"But while we acknowledge the value of the law, while we feel deeply convinced of its excellence when applied in medical practice, we are not unmindful that all human knowledge is necessarily imperfect, and that it follows in its development a progressive course; that in fact time and study are required to bring every branch of science or art to that degree of completeness and certainty of which it will admit.

"To say thus much is to admit the necessity of serious and incessant labour on the part of all true homœopathists. To bring homoeopathy up to our standard of the requisites of medical art we shall do all that lies in our power. We shall spare neither time nor labour nor expense; convinced as we are that being together with all homœopathists-the depositaries of a great truth, we are bound to work it out to the best