Carbo Vegetabilis - General symptoms - Hahnemann

GENERAL

General

WOOD CHARCOAL.

The charcoal of any kind of wood, thoroughly heated to redness, seems to manifested itself uniformly in its effects on the human health, when it has been prepared and potentized in the manner which Homoeopathy uses. I employ the charcoal of birch wood; in some of the provings by others the charcoal of the red beech was used.

Formerly charcoal was considered by physicians as non-medicinal and powerless. Empiricism only added it in its most highly composite powders, for epilepsy, the charcoal of the Tilia Europoea ^linden tree, without being able to adduce any proof of the efficacy of this particular substance. Only in recent times, since LOWITZ, in St. Petersburg, discovered the chemical properties of wood charcoal, especially its power of removing from putrid and mouldy substances their bad odor, and of preserving fluids from fetid smell, physicians began to use it externally (iatro-chemically). They advised rinsing the mouth of fetid odor with powdered charcoal, and covered old putrid ulcers with the same powder, and the fetor was in both instances almost instantaneously alleviated. Also when administered internally in the dose of several drachms it removed the fetor of the stools in autumnal dysentery.

But this medicinal use was, as before mentioned, only a chemical use, but not a dynamic employment penetrating into the internal sphere of life. The mouth rinsed out with it only remained odorless for a few hours.

the ill smell returned every day. The old ulcer was not improved by its application, and the fetor, chemically removed from it for the moment, was always renewed.

it was no cure. The charcoal powder taken in autumnal dysentery. But this medicinal use was, as before mentioned, only a chemical use but not a dynamic employment penetrating into the internal sphere of life. The mouth rinsed out with it only remained odorless for a few hours.

the ill smell returned every day. The old ulcer was not improved by its application, and the fetor, chemically removed from it for the moment, was always renewed.

it was no cure. The charcoal powder taken in autumnal dysentery only chemically removed the fetor of the stools for a short time, but the disease remained and the nauseous smell of the stools quickly returned.

In such a coarse, pulverized state, charcoal can exercise no other than a chemical action. A considerable quantity of wood charcoal in its ordinary crude form may be swallowed without producing the slightest alteration in the health.

It is only by prolonged trituration of the charcoal (as of many other dead and apparently powerless medicinal substances) with a non-medicinal substance, such as sugar of milk, and by dissolving this preparation and potentizing (shaking) these solutions, that the dynamic medicinal power concealed within, and which in the crude state is combined, and so to say slumbering and sleeping (latent), can be awakened and brought to life.

but then its material external must vanish.

The various degrees of potency are employed according to the varying intention in healing, down from the decillion-potency to the million-powder attenuation, using one, two or three fine pellets moistened therewith as a dose.

Arsenicum Album ^Arsenic, Camphora ^camphor and raw coffee have been found antidotes of charcoal, but the spirits of nitre seem to be more efficient.

In healing the diseases to which Carbo Vegetabilis is homoeopathically appropriate, the following symptoms were chiefly relieved or removed

Anguish, irritability.

fearfulness. at night.

peevishness. headache from overheating.

heaviness of the head.

rush of blood to the head.

headache from nausea. tendency of the head to colds.

eyeache from strained vision.

burning in the eyes. heat and.

burning and pressure in the canthi.

closing of the eyes by suppuration, at night.

roaring in the ears. suppuration of the inner ear and discharge from it.

itching of the nose. continued epistaxis.

herpes in the face. chapping of the lips.

bleeding of the gums. toothache from taking cold or warm things in the mouth.

contractive toothache.

gnawing toothache. clucking toothache.

chronic looseness of the teeth.

dryness, or gathering of saliva in the mouth.

. scraping in the throat.

hawking up of much phlegm from the throat.

bitter taste in the mouth.

salty taste in the mouth.

long-continued loathing of meat.

lack of appetite. or thirst.

empty eructation. bitter eructation.

eructation tasting of the fat eaten.

regurgitation of the ingesta.

perspiration while eating.

acidity in the mouth after a meal.

chaotic sensation and pressure in the stomach after a meal.

nausea in the morning.

constant nausea. waterbrash.

at night. lancinative pain in the liver.

stitches in the spleen.

pain as from a bruise in the hypochondria.

tension of the abdomen.

inflation of the abdomen.

pain above the navel, when touched.

colic from driving out.

excessive discharge of flatus.

thin, pale stool. scant stools.

constipation. of the anus.

pain in the varices of the anus.

blood from the anus at every stool.

diminished secretion of urine.

frequent anxious tenesmus of the bladder, by day and night.

wetting the bed. urine too dark.

excoriative pain in urinating.

pressure in the testes.

. unnatural abundance of voluptuous thoughts.

too rapid emission of semen in coitus.

soreness and itching on the pudenda.

itching and burning of the genitals.

swelling of the pudenda.

. scanty menses. paleness of the blood in the catamenia.

vomiting during the menses.

flux from the vagina. leucorrhoea before the menses.

. discharge of water from the nose.

severe cold. constant hoarseness.

morning hoarseness. catarrh and sore throat with the measles.

. short breath during walking.

dropsy of the chest. stitches in the chest.

chaps and pains as from soreness in the chest.

brownish spots on the chest.

drawing pain in the back.

itching pimples on the back.

. pain in the elbow on grasping it.

heat in the hands. restlessness in the legs.

the knees go to sleep.

herpes on the knee. cramp in the calves, at night.

continued insensibility of the feet.

. redness and swelling of the toes, with lancinating pains as after freezing them.

pain in the limbs as from spraining and straining.

pain in the left hypogastrium from a strain in lifting.

the limbs go to sleep.

. throbbing here and there in the body.

tremulousness. jerking of single limbs, by day.

after-effects from yesterday's wine-spree.

chronic ailments from the abuse of cinchona bark.

tendency to take cold.

neetle-rash. herpes. ulcers (on the legs) fetid and bleeding readily.

. sleep in the forenoon.

insomnia on account of restlessness of the body.

phantasies at night and starting from anxious dreams.

. coldness and chill of the body.

night-sweat. morning-sweat.

Any excessive action can be quickly removed by , and still more surely by smelling of .

The symptoms marked were observed by , a physician of St. Petersburg; those marked by the Royal Counselor, M. D., and those with by the late , of Leipzig.

Vegetable charcoal appeared with the animal variety in the and the first edition of the . Carbo Vegetabilis's pathogenesis obtained with the 3d trituration shows 720 symptoms in the former, 930 in the latter work. The fresh symptoms both here and there were , obtained in his later manner.

as the three physicians mentioned all made their contributions to the original list. .

CARBO VEGETABILIS.

Violent urging to stool, with formication in the anus, and pressure on the bladder, toward the sacrum, like a haemorrhoidal colic, recurring in fits.

instead of as tool, there follow violent labor-like pains in the hypogastrium, toward the front and the back, with burning in the anus, and a sensation as if diarrhoea were coming on.

after these labor-like pains, with much effort, some faeces discharged, consisting of soft pieces, followed by a cessation of the pains.;.

* * * * *

The original has , "leaving a sediment;" probably a misprint for "salty."

An attack. in looking out of the window, he is suddenly seized with nausea and vertigo.

he falls down unconscious and lies thus for several minutes, and when he regained his senses he felt as if he had lain in a deep sleep from which he can hardly rouse himself.

after waking up, inclination to vomit, which obliged him to lie down for two hours, and was renewed when he rose up.

then the became very lachrymose and desperate (aft. 6 d.).

In the evening after lying down, anguish, as from oppression of the chest, with heat in the head, heat in the hands and sweat on her forehead.

she could not remain abed, for feeling as if her heart would be crushed.

the objects around seemed to her to become ever closer and smaller, and when it was dark in the room extremely frightful forms appeared before her vision.

At night he wakes up several times on account of pulsation of the head, as if about to have a stroke of apoplexy.

immediately after awaking he was composed, and felt that it was an illusion, for observe in slumber what should happen, his legs and knees were drawn up involuntarily and his back bent.

and he felt that if he had not aroused he would have fainted.

At night, after going to sleep, he wakes up in several attacks.

with a sensation of a rush of blood to the head, with hair on end.

anxiety, accompanied with a shiver, and a feeling as if some one stroked with the hand over his body, and as if ants were running over his skin at every movement in bed.

at the same time the hearing was so sensitive and acute that the slightest sound reechoed in the ear.