discover the medicinal forces and the laws governing their action, need take with him, as an experimenting apparatus, only sano mens in corpore sanoa sound mind in a sound body. Should he invite the toxicologist, the chemist or the botanist to accompany him on his expedition, let them not suppose it is because they are able, in a medicinal point of view, to discover what he cannot, but because their general knowledge may render their company agreeable, and at times their suggestions useful. Thus furnished with apparatus, far surpassing in excellence and value any contrived by human ingenuity, he proceeds to try the various substances around him.

In the appearance of morbid changes, consequent upon the use of one, he discovers the presence of the medicinal forces; while their kind, power and duration of action, he learns respectively from the nature, extent and continuance of those changes.

Thus tracing and studying these forces, we find, that in disposition they are always hostile to human health and life. Whenever introduced into the system they disturb its harmony in some part, and thus excite to resistance the indwelling vital forces. We also find, that those belonging to each medicinal substance have their own particular enmities, attacking particular parts in particular ways. Experiments by the healthy vital test teach us all we can ever know of these peculiar enmities.

It is by the collection of means whose peculiarities and power have thus been studied, that a materia medica is formed.

The works commonly bearing that noble title, composed for the most part, of unimportaat facts, arranged more to suit the fancy of the compiler than the dictates of nature, are a mere burlesque upon science, and a blind guide to all who follow them in the selection of curative means.

To Hahnemann we are indebted for the first materia medica composed of reliable and useful facts.

The "materia medica pura" will ever stand, in the scientific world, a monument to his genius, his learning and his powers of untiring research, while around it, as a nucleus, must ever gather all that is true and good in medicine.

IV.-THEIR USE.

Having now before us both the nature and modus operandi of the medicinal forces, it remains only to consider briefly the character and tendency of disease, in order at once to learn their proper use in the healing art.

There are around us a multitude of agencies, by men designated "morbific causes."

These, whether entering the organism through the mind or through the contact of material atoms, seize upon the vital forces and hinder their action in the preservation of health. The disturbance thus begun spreads from part to part, till disease manifests itself by various sufferings, in mind or body, or in both. If these assailants are weak, nature unaided may overcome them. But if they are too strong, the vital forces are held in their power, while disorder goes on spreading through the system.

art.

In this latter case it is that the physician is called upon to exercise his

Coming to the bed-side of the patient, he must first determine by the symptoms what forces are attacked and in what direction they are held from duty. This determined, he next inquires what assistance he can render.

To attempt the restoration of order through the vital domain, while the very springs and guardians of life are held in durance, would be vain indeed.

Therefore, to set them free is his first and only duty. How to accomplish this by medicinal means he finally inquires.

To operate directly against the morbific influences in the system, as by alkali against acid, he cannot. All his means being pathogenetic, or disease producing in their very nature, must make their impressions invariably upon the vital, and therefore never directly upon the morbific forces.

Hence we draw the practical conclusion, that disease is removed not by the direct action of medicines upon it, but by the action of the vital forces, which they excite. This action of the vital forces must be in the very organs or parts diseased, in order to be curative. Each organ or apparatus in the human system has its own functions and its own forces. The functions of one cannot be performed by the forces belonging to another.

Neither can disease be removed from one by the action of forces belonging to another.

It is true means may be employed, the specific influence of which is upon organs or parts other than those diseased, which, by the power of their general influence, may recite an action of the vital forces implicated by the disease, so as to remove in part or in whole the existing malady. Relief thus gained, however, can never be anticipated with any degree of certainty, and is attended with great expense to the constitution or general health.

Having, then, determined the necessity of selecting a medicine which is known to act upon the forces of the very parts diseased, the physician, aware that different medicines influence the same forces differently, inquires which he ought to prefer in a given case-one that acts in a manner opposite to that of the disease, or rather one that is similar.

If he employs opposite forces, they may bear those of life from their unnatural position, and thus apparently restore them to freedom and to health.

But these having no power or disposition to destroy the morbific influences already in the system, these latter taking advantage of the re-active power of nature, not only continue to exist, but bearing back the vital forces, put them yet further from their sphere of healthful action.

A repetition, then, of the opposite agents, can only result in temporary relief, while the functions of the diseased organs are becoming yet more deranged and irregular.

By necessity, then in order to cure safely and effectually, the physician must employ similar agents, or means capable of producing in the healthy, symptoms similar to those of the disease to be removed.

The medicine being selected in obedience to this necessity, and prepared according to principles already learned for the development of its forces, it is meted out in doses to suit, on the one hand its disease-producing character, and on the other, the diminished resistance of the vital forces.

The medicinal atoms thus ready for use are put upon the tongue, which, with its million papillæ or points of communication, is the best medium for their transmission to the chosen field of action. Arrived there the morbific agents, yet more impalpable by virtue of similarity in nature, become united or incorporated with them.

They act together upon the ever-resisting vital forces. But the medicinal power being unrenewed, they barely carry those forces a little beyond the former point of detention; whence returning with their original strength, aided by an acquired momentum, they bear away the medicinal atoms, with the old invaders absorbed and buried in them.

By this process the physician introduces material atoms which, in nature being similar to the morbific, accomplishes two objects-first, by sudden impulse to bear the vital forces a little further in the same direction as the morbific, and thus to excite them to re-action; and, secondly, by close relationship, to furnish a vehicle in which the morbific forces could more easily be put out by that re-action.

Thus, taking up a drug mass, we have examined it and found,

1st. That with its atoms are connected certain forces, properly termed

medicinal.

2d. That these forces having as their only sphere of action the living animal organism, can be traced and studied only in healthy persons.

3d. And finally, that they can be employed in the safe and rapid cure of diseased humanity, only by virtue of their power to excite a re-action of the forces in the organs or parts diseased; or, in other words, by virtue of their ability to produce a disease, similar to the one we wish to

remove.

Here, then, by reasonings a priori, we have come, step by step, to the minor principles of homeopathy, and finally to its fundamental law. We are now prepared to proclaim,

HOMEOPATHIA EX NECESITATE RERUM.

These internal evidences of our science, confirmed by cures on every hand and in every country, where our practice has extended, sends conviction to our inmost reason, and leaves no room for doubts.

Ye fathers and mothers before me, who have come to join in the festivities of this occasion, to you and to your children are vouchsafed the peaceful and healthful influences of homœopathy.

No more shall you have to dread the unwelcome instruments and agents which served the art of healing in its days of darkness, of cruelty.

When disease may find its way into your dwelling and take you from

1

the circle of business or of pleasure, you shall go to your sick-rooms, not as the condemned criminal goes to his cell, brooding over instruments of torture and of death; nor yet as one entering a dungeon, to engage in mortal combat with an enemy whose tactics are ever-varying, and against whom he has no certain weapon. You shall go to your quiet apartment, free from all sickening sights and smells, with the assurance that curative means are to be employed, pleasant to the senses, certain in their action, and therefore full of promise, for the restoration of health.

And when disease shall come to you, for the last time, incurable and unsparing, you shall not lie down, suffering only what the true science, and art of healing cannot relieve; and with faculties undisturbed and unbeclouded by oblivious draughts or potions, you shall pass away, not as the drunkard or the beast, but as intelligent God-like creatures.

And ye men of healing, brothers in a common and noble cause, encouraged by the exhibitions of this day; inspired with new confidence and zeal, go spread the blessings of Homœopathy far and wide. Some of you are already at the meridian life, "heroes of more than a hundred battles" well fought with error and disease; yet the example of your master, whose labors the lapse of more than four-score years did not lessen, beckons you on to study and to practice.

Sustained by a consciousness of doing good, and by the patronage of the most intelligent in every community, let the summer and the winter, as they come and go, find you still in the sick room, and from house to house dispensing the blessings of health. Though you have not here a full reward, or a life of comfort, or Sabbath of rest, your rewards, your comforts and your rest will be unending in that coming and better life.

After the lapse of another century, you will be gathered here to celebrate the birth-day of Hahnemann? Long before the coming of that day we shall all be gone our children will be gone. Three generations will have passed away, and the earth will be all peopled anew.

It is impossible for us to conceive what changes that period will bring; but one thing we know, that truth will be the same then that it is to-day. Men and their theories may pass away, but facts and their legitimate conclusions never.

Systems of medicine, based on theories, may change and pass away, but homœopathy, based on truth, reared with philosophic care, and covered with the blessings of millions restored to health, will stand, a noble temple, beautiful without, to which the coming ages shall not bring their gathered treasures, adling town to town, till the end of time.

THERE is no subject more replete with interest to the thoughtful student than the gradual development, the steady progress, and final triumph of GREAT TRUTHS.

They mark the track of human genius along the dreary and difficult way of time-they stand like majestic towers, whose foundations had been laid by Titans, and the superstructures completed by their giant sons!

But like that best and purest passion of the youthful heart, whose course was destined "never to run smooth," every great discovery, every revelation of the inspired human mind, though given for universal good, has ever been met by most determined opposition from those whose interest it was intended to promote! What doctrine has ever been established without its victim? What system has been founded without its martyr? It would seem, indeed, as though men in all ages of the world had determined to heap their heaviest censures, and inflict their severest punishments on the benefactors whom their best gifts could not adequately reward!

We do read of One, who with clearest and keenest vision deciphered the physical story of the universe, and proved the wisdom of Heaven in the simplicity of its laws: He, for the space of fifteen hundred years, was doomed to oblivion; supplanted by a bold adventurer in science, who had only sufficient tact to suit an opposite and false theory to the apparent phenomena which the uninstructed mind could more readily apprehend!

VOL. IV-5