Progress towards Homœopathy.

At the Meeting of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Edinburgh, on the 5th of December last, a paper was read by its author, entitled “A few Remarks on Dilution as a Principle in Therapeutics," by Benjamin Bell, Esq., F.R.C.S. The remarks were chiefly confined to the metallic salts. Mr. Bell showed, in regard to iron, how very small a portion existed in the blood, and how preposterous, therefore, were the large doses attempted to be forced in, much of which must be carried out, in all probability causing irritation. He also showed how much more likely a substance largely diluted was to be absorbed by the capillaries than one presented in the rough state of nature. Similar remarks were then made in regard to other metallic substances, and even extended to external applications. The whole paper was eminently suggestive, and given by the author with a remarkable absence of all dogmatic assertion. (Medical Times and Gazette, Dec. 15, 1855.)

BOOKS RECEIVED.

Hydro-therapeutics, or the Water-cure, considered as a branch of Medical Treatment, by Dr. WILLIAM MACLEOD: London, Hamilton, Adams & Co., 1855.

The North American Homœopathic Journal, Nos. XIII aud XIV. The Philadelphia Journal of Homœopathy, Nos. IV to VII.

Clinical Researches concerning the Homœopathic Treatment of Asiatic Cholera, by J. P. TESSIER, M.D., translated by C. J. HEMPEL, M.D.: New York, Radde, 1855.

Clinical Remarks, concerning the Homœopathic Treatment of Pneumonia, by J. P. TESSIER, M.D., translated by C. J. HEMPEL, M.D.: New York, Radde, 1855.

Gymnastics an essential branch of National Education, both public and private, by CAPTAIN CHIOSSO: London, Walton and Maberley, 1854.

The Russian Bath; second edition, with some suggestions regarding public health, addressed to the Right Hon. W. F. Cowper, M.P., President of the Board of Health, by M. ROTH, M.D.: London, Groombridge and Sons, 1855.

Journal de la Société Gallicane.

Homœopathy, a letter addressed to the Editor of the "North and South Shields Gazette," by J. F. KENNEDY.

Homœopathic Gleanings, Nos. I. to VI.: Manchester, Turner, 1855.

WM. DAVY & SON, Gilbert-street, Oxford-street, London.

Read before the British Homœopathic Society, January 3rd, 1856.

THAT there exist, from time to time, if not at all times, certain agents, capable of impressing the human constitution so powerfully as to excite, in a number of persons simultaneously, a particular form of disease, is a point which the history of medicine sufficiently establishes. What those agents are, and through what media they exert their influence, are still unsettled questions. But, though uncertain as to their precise nature and modus operandi, the changes continually going on in the air we breathe, and the earth we tread upon, leave us in no difficulty to account for their existence. The grosser of these changes-from hot to cold, from wet to dry-are not only appreciable by our senses, but the way in which they impress the frame and disturb its healthy action, are, to a certain extent, understood, Depending mainly upon the succession of the seasons, they bring in their train certain diseases, wearing so uniformly the same features, that they are almost as familiar, and their advent may be almost as certainly predicted, as the changes of the seasons themselves. To these we owe the alvine diseases of autumn, the respiratory disturbances of winter, the exanthemata of spring, and the fevers

of summer.

VOL. XIV, NO. LVI.-APRIL, 1856.

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There is another class of agencies-comet-like-eccentric in their course, and distant in the intervals at which they appear, the source and operation of which is enveloped in the deepest mystery. To these we owe those fearful scourges, whose history is written in hecatombs of victims-the black death, the sweating disease, the plague, of the middle ages; the cholera, small pox, and influenza, of modern times. It is to this class of diseases, probably on account of the violence of their symptoms, and their fatality, that the term epidemic has been almost exclusively, but I thing erroneously, restricted; whilst others, less violent, less fatal, but as truly epidemic, are entirely overlooked.

These changes I believe to be always in operation, that each one impresses the human frame in a particular way, and excites it to the development of a particular kind of disease, and that, as a necessary consequence, all diseases, not accidental, or having a local source, have a tendency to become epidemic: such epidemic being regulated in its extent and duration, by the power of each particular change, and the rapidity with which one succeeds another. In no other way can we satisfactorily account for the rise and spread of any epidemic, or for the variations that appear even in the most common and fixed form of epidemic disorder. How else can we account for the fact, that at one period scarlet fever shall be universally benign, and at another as universally malignant? If, then, it be granted that those changing influences, whatever they be, are so constantly at work as to effect such modifications in diseases of the most permanent character, are we not equally justified in believing that the same changes, as they succeed each other, impress upon the human frame successive tendencies to the development of different diseases? My own observation is strongly confirmatory of this view of the subject. It has rarely fallen to my lot to treat isolated cases of acute disease, (for all epidemic disorders belong of necessity to this class.) The first case is almost sure to be the forerunner of several more of the same kind. I make use of the qualifying term "almost," because there are exceptions to this, as to other rules. There are some causes of disease of so purely accidental a nature, as to take the complaint to which they give rise out of the category of epidemics; such, for instance as the

production of Gastritis by a debauch, or Delirium tremens by prolonged intemperance. These, with others of analogous kind, will occur at any time, on the application of the particular exciting cause, and do not, therefore, come within the meaning of the term epidemic, which I would restrict to those complaints which cannot be traced to such palpable causes. Of these, I repeat, one rarely sees single cases; they come in batches, without assignable cause, last a longer or shorter time, disappear as capriciously, and are altogether lost sight of, until a recurrence of the conditions favourable to their reproduction brings them again upon the stage. Thus, at one period you shall observe, within the space of a few days, a rapid succession of cases of inflammation of the lungs; at another, of bronchitis; at another, of croup; at another, of asthma; at another, of hooping cough; at another, of sore throat; at another, of erysipelas; at another, of rheumatism; at another, of neuralgia, in its several forms of hemicrania, prosopalgia,* toothache, sciatica; at another, lumbago; at another, pleurodynia; at another, jaundice; at another, hydrocephalus; at another, ophthalmia; at another, convulsions; at another, cystitis; at another, shingles; at another, mumps; at another, vertigo. To these may be added. the well known disorders of the bowels, cholera, dysentery, diarrhoea; the exanthema, with varicella, nettle rash, and other skin diseases; the common forms of fever, and lying-in fever; and even the disposition amongst females to miscarriage. I have enumerated this list of disorders upon the strength of my own experience, and so steadily have I found the epidemic tendency to pervade all of them, that I entertain but little doubt, that a wider field of observation, would equally display the same tendency in almost every acute disease to which humanity is exposed.

But not only do I believe that each particular disease is rendered epidemic by its specific agency; not only do I think that one change in the conditions of our existence engenders pneumonia this week; another, hooping cough the next week; and

* Within the month immediately following the disappearance of the severe frost in December, 30 cases of different kinds of face ache came under the writer's observation.

a third, some other disease the week after, or all of them simultaneously, to be succeeded as speedily by others: I am further persuaded that besides those changes which give rise to the transient epidemic affections of particular organs, there is, also, in operation, at most times, another agency, of a more lasting kind, determining, not so much the particular organ that shall be affected, as impressing a particular character upon diseased action generally. I ventured to express this opinion, in a paper which I read before this society in 1852, on the Furuncular Epidemic, which then prevailed. On that occasion I endeavoured to illustrate my meaning by showing, that, dividing the previous 54 months into three periods of 18 months each, the first, from the beginning of 1847 to the middle of 1848, was characterized by a general inflammatory type of disease, including nearly all the phlegmasiæ, and ending with the Influenza epidemic. That the second period, from the middle of July 1848 to the end of 1849, was distinguished by a powerfully predominating tendency to the development of disorders of the stomach and bowels; this period including the second Cholera epidemic. That the third period, from the end of 1850 to the middle of 1851, was as strongly marked by a prevailing tendency to pustular disorders of the skin, of which the furunculus, or boil, was the leading type. There is one point connected with this last period, which the subsequent lapse of time has invested with peculiar interest-that interest which attaches to the fulfilment of a prediction. You will remember that, at the time to which I am alluding, there was a great deal of excitement on account of the somewhat sudden and violent outbreak of small рох. An alarm was raised that that frightful scourge was likely to resume its ancient dominion, and that vaccination had lost its protective power. I had no such apprehension. Regarding the greater prevalence of small pox, only as one form of the then existing tendency to the development of pustular disease, I did not hesitate to predict that "when that tendency shall have exhausted itself, small pox will recede within its former limits, and vacci nation re-assert its supremacy." It is a matter of deep interest to my mind, as strongly confirmatory of the foregoing views, that this prediction should have been so completely verified.