Organon §273 – 274

The Art of Healing

 §273 – Sixth Edition

In no case under treatment is it necessary and therefore not permissible to administer to a patient more than one single, simple medicinal substance at one time. It is inconceivable how the slightest doubt could exist as to whether it was more consistent with nature and more rational to prescribe a single, simple medicine at one time in a disease or a mixture of several differently acting drugs. It is absolutely not allowed in homœopathy, the one true, simple and natural art of healing, to give the patient at one time two different medicinal substances.

¹Two substances, opposite to each other, united into neutral. Natrum and middle salts by chemical affinity in unchangeable proportions, as well as sulphurated metals found in the earth and those produced by technical art in constant combining proportions of sulphur and alkaline salts and earths, for instance (natrum sulph. and calcarea sulph.) as well as those ethers produced by distillation of alcohol and acids may together with phosphorus be considered as simple medicinal substances by the homœopathic physician and used for patients. On the other hand, those extracts obtained by means of acids of the so-called alkaloids of plants, are exposed to great variety in their preparation (for instance, chinin, strychnine, morphine), and can, therefore, not be accepted by the homœopathic physician as simple medicines, always the same, especially as he possesses, in the plants themselves, in their natural state (Peruvian bark, nux vomica, opium) every quality necessary for healing. Moreover, the alkaloids are not the only constituents of the plants.

While a medicine is being used, some other medicine is not required for any patient and should not be used. It is astonishing to entertain a doubt whether it is good to use medicine for one disease or to use different medicines having different characteristics. According to homoeopathy, it is objectionable to use two different medicines at a time.

§274 – Sixth Edition

As the true physician finds in simple medicines, administered singly and uncombined, all that he can possibly desire (artificial disease-force which are able by homœopathic power completely to overpower, extinguish, and permanently cure natural diseases), he will, mindful of the wise maxim that “it is wrong to attempt to employ complex means when simple means suffice,” never think of giving as a remedy any but a single, simple medicinal substance; for these reasons also, because even though the simple medicines were thoroughly proved with respect to their pure peculiar effects on the unimpaired healthy state of man, it is yet impossible to foresee how two and more medicinal substances might, when compounded, hinder and alter each other’s actions on the human body; and because, on the other hand, a simple medicinal substance when used in diseases, the totality of whose symptoms is accurately known, renders efficient aid by itself alone, if it be homœopathically selected; and supposing the worst case to happen, that it was not chosen in strict conformity to similarity of symptoms, and therefore does no good, it is yet so far useful that it promoted our knowledge of therapeutic agents, because, by the new symptoms excited by it in such a case, those symptoms which this medicinal substance had already shown in experiments on the healthy human body are confirmed, an advantage that is lost by the employment of all compound remedies.¹

¹When the rational physician has chosen the perfectly homœopathic medicine for the well-considered case of disease and administered it internally, he will leave to irrational allopathic routine the practice of giving drinks or fomentations of different plants, of injecting medicated glysters and of rubbing in this or the other ointment.

By using correctly indicated remedies according to the principle of “Single drug-single dose” without mixing with others, the desired effects would result in the required manner ie., similar artificial diseases would be produced and help curing the natural diseases. The doctor should be intelligent in selecting the clearcut method of treatment available and avoiding a difficult method. Single drug should be used always. When these drugs are proved on healthy persons, the truthful behavior of each medicine is exhaustively proved. If two or more medicines are mixed, it is not known how they influence the human body and how one medicine interacts with the other. Further, it has been proved clearly that the medicine, which is similar to the totality of symptoms in the body, can only show its curative effect independently. If similarity is not accomplished, there is no loss. The only loss is that there is not utility. In such cases, the symptoms of the drug are temporarily precipitated in him. By this, the totality of such medicines will be once again proved. If number of medicines are used simultaneously, there is no possibility to observe this aspect also.

Explanation

The author (Dr. Hahnemann) has summerized the knowledge of medicines contained in this book.

• Only those medicines which are proved on healthy human beings should be used on patients.
• They should be used according to the principle of single drug, single dose.
• If medicines are mixed and used, it is not known how one interacts with the other and how the resultant drug influences the human body.
• Curing diseases by similarity of symptoms is an established truth.
• If used by mistake without similarity, there is no loss except that it does not work. (If such drugs are used in number of doses continuously without caring whether they worked or not, notable harm occurs. New diseases crop up. Such a harm is multiplied by use of number of drugs simultaneously. Allopathy is still more harmful.)

In homoeopathy, there is not harm if one dose of a dissimilar drug is used. Totality of that drug, which was not present in the patient earlier, may temporarily appear in the patient. It means proving the totality of symptoms of that drug once again. If mixed with other drugs, this possibility is also ruled out. (In Allopathy, where medicines are prepared by mixing so many substances, the different nature of each substance in its original state cannot be understood.)

Original in Telegu by Dr. E. Krishnamacharya
Translation by Dr. E. Krishnamacharya

Painting by Alexander Beydeman  (1826–1869), Homeopathy watching horrors of Allopathy, 1857, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia