Homoeopathy fairly represented : a reply to Professor Simpson's "Homoeopathy" misrepresented / by William Henderson.

  • Henderson, William, 1810-1872.
Date:
1854
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Homoeopathy fairly represented : a reply to Professor Simpson's "Homoeopathy" misrepresented / by William Henderson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    There is yet another aspect in which these asserted in- stances of homoeopathic deception can be viewed, and a far more rational one it is than either of the others, namely, that let Mr. Horace Green, Mr. Lee, Dr. Taylor, and Dr. Simpson, assert what they may, the deceptions that are al- leged were and are impossible. The charge is, not simply that large doses were used in the cases referred to—that would be a minor matter, as a man is at liberty to employ what dose he prefers—but that the said doses were pretended to be minute. Now, reader, I hope you will be in a humour to apply the knout to the inventors of foul charges against their honester brethren, when I tell you, that such a dose of strychnia, nux vomica, or morphia, as these persons specify, could not possibly be taken by any man, in possession of his senses, without being detected by the intense bitterness of their taste! Had the accusers remembered this difficulty in the way of their instances being credible, they would not have ventured to prefer the charges they have made, in con- nexion with such substances at least; for they must have be- thought them that, as homoeopathic doses- are well known to have no taste, no Homceopathist could dream of deceiving his patients by drugs so furiously bitter as these. To give the unmedical reader some idea of the obstacle to the alleged deception, presented by the bitterness of strychnia, I may observe that, according to Sir Robert Kane, one part re- quires 7000 parts of cold water for solution, and yet, if one part of this be diluted with 100 parts more of water, this liquor tastes strongly bitter.* Or, what is the same thing, one grain of strychnia, dissolved in seven hundred thousand grains of water, or above eleven gallons, may still be detected by its strongly bitter taste. If, then, the 700,000th part of a grain of strychnia is strongly bitter, what must be the bit- * Elements of Chemistry. 842.