Nature Cure
by
Henry Lindlahr
Part 4 out of 7
physician found it necessary to take as many as four or five
additional specimens before he pronounced him free from the
diphtheria germ. The boy was not released from quarantine until five
weeks had passed.
During all this time his only attendant was his mother and the
osteopathic physician who came daily. The boy has fully recovered
and has suffered no bad results that often follow such diseases.
In contrast to this experience of ours, I would like to cite the
case of a neighbor of ours whose little girl died of the disease
under the antitoxin treatment. She recovered from the diphtheria,
but her heart failed and she died suddenly. They had a regular M. D.
and a trained nurse. Her mother took ill, but recovered. The father
told me that their drug bill alone amounted to $75.
We want to express to you our gratitude for the knowledge and
confidence that you have so freely given to us, and you are at
liberty to make whatever use of this letter that you desire.
Sincerely yours,
HINTON WHITE
1443 Cuyler Ave., Chicago, Ill.
This letter proves that my claims and assertions regarding the
curability of diphtheria by natural methods are not extravagant or
untrue. In this case, as in many others, I gave directions for
treatment verbally and over the telephone without having seen the
patient personally.
I am convinced, furthermore, that this patient would have made just
as good a recovery without the osteopathic treatment. I recommended
the attendance of an osteopathic physician in order to ease the
burden of responsibility on the part of the parents. If the child
had died, they would have been blamed by friends and relatives for
their seeming foolhardiness.
The experience of Mr. White's neighbor is another proof of the fatal
effect of the antitoxin treatment. The antitoxin "cured" the
diphtheria, but-the child died!
Once more I repeat: The hydropathic treatment will give equally good
results in appendicitis, meningitis, scarlet fever, and all other
forms of acute diseases. If this be a fact, why should not my
colleagues of the Regular School of Medicine give the hydropathic
method a fair trial, the more so since in Germany, even among the
physicians of the Regular School, hydropathy as a remedy is fast
superseding antitoxin! Is it not worth while when the "mysterious
sequelae" referred to by Dr. Osler, and the many cases of chronic
invalidism which he does not connect with the disease or its
treatment, might thus be avoided?
Chapter XVII
Vaccination
The pernicious aftereffects of vaccination upon the system are
similar to those of the various serum and antitoxin treatments.
Jenner, an English barber and chiropodist, is usually credited with
the discovery of vaccination. The doubtful honor, however, belongs
in reality to an old Circassian woman who, according to the
historian Le Duc, in the year 1672 startled Constantinople with the
announcement that the Virgin Mary had revealed to her an unfailing
preventive against the smallpox.
Her specific was inoculation with the genuine smallpox virus. But
even with her the idea was not an original one, because the
principle of isopathy (curing a disease with its own disease
products) was explicitly taught a hundred years before that by
Paracelsus, the great genius of the Renaissance of learning of the
Middle Ages. But even he was only voicing the secret teachings of
ancient folklore, sympathy healing and magic dating back to the
Druids and Seers of ancient Britain and Germany.
The Circassian seeress cut a cross in the flesh of people and
inoculated this wound with the smallpox virus. Together with this
she prescribed prayer, abstinence from meat and fasting for forty
days.
As at that time smallpox was a terrible and widespread scourge, the
practice of inoculation was carried all over Europe. At first the
operation was performed by women and laymen; but when vaccination
became popular and people were willing to pay for it, the doctors
began to incorporate it into their regular practice.
Popular superstitions run a very similar course to epidemics. They
have a period of inception, of virulence and of abatement. As germs
and bacteria become inactive and die a natural death in their own
poisonous excreta, so popular superstitions die as a natural result
of their own falsities and exaggerations.
It soon became evident that inoculation with the virus did not
prevent smallpox, but, on the contrary, frequently caused it; and
therefore the practice gradually fell into disuse, only to be
revived by Jenner about one hundred years later in a modified form.
He substituted cowpox virus for smallpox virus.
Modern allopathy, in applying the isopathic principle, gives large
and poisonous doses of virus, lymph, serums and antitoxins, while
homeopathy, as did ancient mysticism, applies the isopathic remedies
in highly diluted and triturated doses only.
From England vaccination gradually spread over the civilized world
and during the nineteenth century the smallpox disease (variola)
constantly diminished in virulence and frequency until today it has
become of comparatively rare occurrence.
"Therefore vaccination has exterminated smallpox," say the disciples
of Jenner.
Is that really so? Is vaccination actually a preventive of smallpox?
This seems very doubtful when the advocates of vaccination
themselves do not believe it. "What," I hear them say, "we do not
believe in our own theory?" Evidently you do not, my friends. If you
believe that vaccination protects you against smallpox, why are you
afraid of catching it from those who are not vaccinated? If you are
thoroughly protected, as you claim to be, how can you catch the
disease from those who are not protected? Why do you not allow the
other fellow to have his fill of smallpox and then enjoy a good
laugh on him? The fact of the matter is you know full well that you
are not safe, that you can catch the disease just as readily as the
unprotected.
German statistics are more reliable than those of any other country.
In the years of 1870-71 smallpox was rampant in the Fatherland. Over
1,000,000 persons had the disease, and 120,000 died. Ninety-six
percent of these had been vaccinated and only four percent had not
been protected. Most of the victims were vaccinated, once at least,
shortly before they took the disease.
In 1888 Bismarck sent an address to the governments of all the
German states in which it was admitted that numerous eczematous
diseases, even those of an epidemic nature, were directly
attributable to vaccination and that the origin and cure of smallpox
were still unsolved problems.
In this message to the various legislatures the great statesman
said: "The hopes placed in the efficacy of the cowpox virus as a
preventive of smallpox have proved entirely deceptive."
Realizing this to be a fact, most of the German governments have
modified or entirely relinquished their compulsory vaccination laws.
"But," our opponents insist, "you cannot deny that smallpox has
greatly diminished since the almost universal adoption of
vaccination."
Certainly the disease has diminished. But so have diminished and, in
fact, nearly disappeared the plague, the Black Death, cholera, the
bubonic plague, yellow fever and numerous other epidemic pests which
only recently decimated entire nations.
Not one of these epidemics was treated by vaccination. Why, then,
did they abate and practically disappear?
Not vaccination, but the more universal adoption of soap, bathtubs,
all kinds of sanitary measures, such as plumbing, drainage,
ventilation and more hygienic modes of living generally have subdued
smallpox as well as all other plagues.
Many of us remember how the yellow fever raged in Havanna during the
Spanish occupancy. Within two months after the energetic Yankees
took possession and gave the filthy city a good scouring, yellow
fever had entirely disappeared--without any yellow fever
vaccination.
The question is now in order why, of all the dreaded plagues of the
past, smallpox alone survives to this day.
The answer is: on account of vaccination. If scrofulous and
syphilitic poisons were not artificially kept alive in human blood
by vaccination, smallpox would by this time be as rare as cholera
and yellow fever.
Thanks to the oft-repeated compulsory vaccination of every citizen,
young and old, we as a nation have become saturated with the
smallpox virus. Is it any wonder that every once in a while this
latent taint breaks out in acute epidemics?
Undoubtedly, the almost universal systematic contamination and
degeneration of vital fluids and tissues, not alone with vaccine
virus, but also with many other filthy serums, antitoxins and drug
poisons, account in a large measure for the steady increase of
tuberculosis, cancer, insanity and a multitude of other chronic
destructive diseases unknown among primitive people that have not
come in contact with the blessings (?) of vaccination.
By weakening the system's reactionary powers against one disease,
its reactionary powers against all diseases are weakened. In other
words, creating in the body a form of chronic smallpox by means of
vaccination favors the development of all kinds of chronic diseases.
Quit sowing the seed, gentlemen, and you will cease reaping the
harvest. By the mercurial suppression of syphilis and by means of
vaccination you are perpetuating smallpox.
What has syphilis to do with smallpox? They are very closely
related, and similar in appearance, symtomatology and in their
effects upon the organism.
A German physician, Dr. Cruwell, who studied the subject thoroughly,
says: "Every vaccination with so-called cowpox virus means
syphilitic infection. Cowpox is not a disease peculiar to cattle; it
is always due to syphilitic or smallpox infection from the diseased
hands of human beings. Cowpox pustules have been found only on the
udders of milk cows which came in contact with human hands. Cattle
roaming in pasture and prairie have never been affected by cowpox,
nor have domesticated steers and oxen. If this disease were a
disorder peculiar to cattle, both sexes would be equally affected.
Jenner's cowpox was caused by the diseased hands of the syphilitic
milkmaid, Sarah Nehnes."
Vaccination of healthy children and adults is often followed by a
multitude of symptoms which cannot be distinguished from syphilis,
viz., characteristic ulcers and eczematous eruptions, swellings of
the axillary and other lymphatic glands, atrophy of the mammary
glands in the breasts of women and of girls above the age of
puberty, etc.
This explains the constantly growing demand for "bust foods" and
"bust developers." A perfectly developed bust has become so rare
that many hundreds of beauty doctors and of business concerns that
make a specialty of developing the flat-bosomed realize thousands of
dollars annually. One firm in this city, and a small concern at
that, has made from $2,500 to $5,000 a year and has over ten
thousand names on its constantly increasing list of patrons.
It is reasonable to assume that almost without exception these ten
thousand women had been vaccinated from one to three times before
the age of puberty. When this is realized, and the fact that
vaccination dries up the mammary glands is taken into account, is it
not time to pause and consider?
The figures of this one small concern represent the report of only
one out of several hundred such firms doing business in all parts of
the country.
Some years ago, a disease similar to smallpox broke out among the
sheep in certain parts of Scotland. As a preventive, the sheep were
vaccinated. In the course of a few years it was noticed that a great
many ewes were unable to nourish their lambs. With the
discontinuance of vaccination this phenomenon disappeared.
Does this help to explain why nowadays over fifty percent of human
mothers are incapable of nursing their babies?
Looking Forward
At present the trend of allopathic medical science is undoubtedly
toward the serum, antitoxin and vaccine treatment. Practically all
medical research tends that way. Every few days we see in the daily
papers reports of new serums and antitoxins which are claimed to
cure or create immunity to certain diseases.
Suppose the research and practice of medical science continue along
these lines and are generally accepted or, as the medical
associations would have it, forced upon the public by law. What
would be the result? Before a child reached the years of
adolescence, it would have had injected into its blood the vaccines,
serums, and antitoxins of smallpox, hydrophobia, tetanus (lockjaw),
cerebro-spinal meningitis, typhoid fever, diphtheria, pneumonia,
scarlet fever, etc.
If allopathy were to have its way, the blood of the adult would be a
mixture of dozens of filthy bacterial extracts, disease taints and
destructive drug poisons. The tonsils and adenoids, the appendix
vermiformis and probably a few other parts of the human anatomy
would be extirpated in early youth under compulsion of the health
departments.
What is more rational and sensible: the endeavor to produce immunity
to disease by making the human body the breeding ground for all
sorts of antibacteria and antipoisons, or to create natural immunity
by building up the blood on a normal basis, purifying the body of
morbid matter and poisons, correcting mechanical lesions and by
cultivating the right mental attitude? Which one of these methods is
more likely to be disease-building, which health-building?
Just imagine what human blood will be like in coming generations if
this artificial contamination with all sorts of disease taints and
drug poisons is to be forced upon the people!
Chapter XVIII
Surgery
The discoverers of anesthetics are classed among the greatest
benefactors of humanity, because it is believed that ether,
chloroform, cocaine and similar nerve-paralyzing agents have greatly
lessened the sum of human suffering. I doubt, however, that this is
true.
Anesthetics have made surgery technically easy and have done away
with the pain caused directly by the incisions; but on the other
hand, these marvelous effects of pain-killing drugs have encouraged
indiscriminate and unnecessary operations to such an extent that at
least nine-tenths of all the surgical operations performed today are
uncalled for. In most instances these ill-advised mutilations are
followed by lifelong weakness and suffering, which far outweigh the
temporary pains formerly endured when unavoidable operations were
performed without the use of anesthesia.
We do not wish to be understood as condemning unqualifiedly any and
all surgical interventions in the treatment of human ailments. An
operation may occasionally be absolutely necessary as a means of
saving life. Surgery is also indicated in cases of injury, such as
wounds or fractured bones, in certain obstetrical complications and
in other affections of a purely mechanical nature.
In all such cases anesthetics prevent much suffering which cannot be
avoided in any other way. But anyone who has had an opportunity to
watch the prolonged misery of the victims of un-called-for
operations will not doubt that anesthesia has been a two-edged sword
which has inflicted many more wounds than it has healed.
Many physicians have recognized more or less distinctly the
uselessness and harmfulness of "Old School" medical treatment.
Dissatisfied and disgusted with old-fashioned drugging, they turn to
surgery, convinced that in it they possess an exact scientific
method of curing ailments. They seem to think that the surest way to
cure a diseased organ is to remove it with the knife--fine reasoning
for school boys, but not worthy of men of science.
I, for my part, cannot understand how an organ can be cured after it
has been extirpated and, preserved in alcohol, adorns the specimen
cabinet of the surgeon.
Destruction or Cure--Which Is Better?
"But," the surgeon says, "we do not remove organs from the body
unless they have become useless."
However, this claim is not borne out by actual facts. During the
past ten years thousands of patients have come under our
treatment, both in the sanitarium and in the downtown offices, whose
family physicians had declared that in order to save their lives
they must submit to the knife without delay. With very few
exceptions these people were cured by us without using a poisonous
drug, an antiseptic or a knife.
Several women who, years ago, were confronted with removal of the
ovaries, are today the joyful mothers of children. Many of our
former patients, who were treated by "Old School" physicians for
acute or chronic appendicitis and were strongly urged to have the
offending organ removed, are today alive and well and still in
possession of their vermiform appendices. Other patients were
threatened with operations for kidney, gall and bladder stones;
fibroid and other tumors; floating kidneys; stomach troubles;
intestinal and uterine disorders, not to mention the multitude of
children whose tonsils and adenoids were to have been removed. All
of these onetime surgical cases have escaped the knife and are doing
very well indeed with their bodies intact and in possession of the
full quota of organs given them by Nature.
Is it not better to cure a diseased organ than to remove it? Nature
Cure proves every day that the better way is at the same time the
easiest way.
Thousands of men and women operated upon for some local ailment
which could have been cured easily by natural methods of treatment
are condemned by these inexcusable mutilations to lifelong
suffering. Many, if not actually suffering pain, have been
unnecessarily unsexed and in other ways incapacitated for the normal
functions and natural enjoyments of life.
Cases of this kind are the most pitiable of all that come under our
observation. When we learn that a major operation has been performed
upon a consultant, our barometer of hope drops considerably. We know
from much experience that the mutilation of the human organism has a
tendency to lessen the chances of recovery; such patients are nearly
always lacking in recuperative power.
A body deprived of important parts or organs is forever unbalanced.
It is like a watch with a spring or a wheel taken out; it may run,
but never quite right; it is hypersensitive and easily thrown out of
balance by any adverse influence.
The Human Body Is a Unit
We are realizing more and more that the human body is a homogeneous
and harmonious whole, and that we cannot injure one part of it
without damaging other parts and often the entire organism. Cutting
in the vital organs means cutting in the brain. It affects the
functions of the nervous system most profoundly.
A physician in Vienna has written a very interesting book in which
he shows that the inner membranes of the nose are in close
relationship and sympathy with distant parts and organs of the body.
He located in the nose one small area which corresponds to the
lungs. By irritating this area with an electric needle he could
provoke asthmatic attacks in patients subject to this disease. By
anesthetizing the same area he could stop immediately severe attacks
of asthma and of coughing. Another area in the nasal cavity
corresponds to the genital organs. The doctor proved that by
electric irritation applied to this area abortions could be
produced, and that by anesthesia of the same area in the nose,
uterine hemorrhages could be stopped.
These and many other facts of experience throw a wonderful light
upon the unity of the human organism. The body resembles a watch.
You cannot injure one part of it without affecting its entire
mechanism.
The evil aftereffects of surgical operations do not always manifest
at once. On the contrary, the surgical treatment is frequently
followed by a period of seeming improvement. The troublesome local
symptoms have been removed, and aftereffects of the mutilation have
not had time to assert themselves. But sooner or later the old
symptoms return in aggravated form, or a new set of complications
arises. The patient is made to believe that the first operation was
a perfect success and that this latest crop of difficulties has
nothing to do with the former, but is something entirely new. At
other times he is assured that the first operation did not go deep
enough, that it failed to reach the seat of the trouble and must be
done over again.
And so the work of mutilation goes merrily on. The disease poisons
in the body set up one center of inflammation after another. These
centers the surgeon promptly removes; but the real disease, the
venereal, psoriatic or scrofulous taint, the uric or oxalic acid,
the poisonous alkaloids and ptomaines affecting every cell and every
drop of blood in the body, these elude the surgeon's knife and
create new ulcers, abscesses, inflammations, stones, cancers, etc.,
as fast as the old ones are extirpated.
Those who have studied the previous chapters carefully will readily
comprehend these facts. They will know that acute and subacute
conditions represent Nature's cleansing and healing efforts, and
that local suppression by drug or knife only serves to turn Nature's
corrective and purifying activities into chronic disease.
The highest art of the true physician is to preserve and to restore,
not to mutilate or destroy.
Chapter XIX
Chronic Diseases
The "Old School" of medical science defines acute diseases as those
which run a brief and more or less violent course and chronic
diseases as those which run a protracted course and have a tendency
to recur.
Nature Cure attaches a broader and more significant meaning to these
terms. This will have become apparent from our discussion of the
causes, the progressive development and the purpose of acute
diseases in the preceding pages.
From the Nature Cure viewpoint, the chronic condition is the latent,
constitutional disease encumbrance, whereas acute disease represents
Nature's efforts to rectify abnormal conditions, to overcome and
eliminate hereditary or acquired morbid taints and systemic poisons
and to reestablish normal structure and functions.
To use an illustration: In a case of permanent or recurrent itchy
psoriasis, the "Old School" physician would look upon the itchy skin
eruption as the chronic disease, while we should see in the external
eczema an attempt of the healing forces of Nature to remove from the
system the inner, latent hereditary or acquired psora, which
constitutes the real chronic disease.
It stands to reason that the exterior eruptions should not be
suppressed by any means whatever, but that the only true and really
effective method of treatment consists in eliminating from the
organism the inner, latent psoric taint. After this is accomplished,
the external "skin disease" will disappear of its own accord.
As another illustration of the radical difference in our respective
points of view, let us take hemorrhoids (piles). The regular
physician considers the local hemorrhoidal enlargements in
themselves the chronic disease, while the Nature Cure practitioner
looks upon hemorrhoids as Nature's effort to rid the system of
certain morbid encumbrances and poisons which have accumulated as a
result of sluggish circulation, chronic constipation, defective
elimination through kidneys, lungs, and skin and from many other
causes.
These constitutional abnormalities, which are the real chronic
disease, have to be treated and corrected. After this has been done,
the hemorrhoidal enlargements and discharges will take care of
themselves.
It is, therefore, absolutely irrational, and frequently followed by
the most serious consequences, to surgically remove the piles or to
suppress the hemorrhoidal discharges and thereby to drive these
concentrated poison extracts back into the system.
In a number of cases we have traced paralysis, insanity,
tuberculosis, cancer and other forms of chronic destructive diseases
to the forcible suppression of hemorrhoids.
Chronic disease, from the viewpoint of Nature Cure philosophy, means
that the organism has become permeated with morbid matter and
poisons to such an extent that it is no longer able to throw off
these encumbrances by a vigorous, acute eliminative effort. The
chronic condition, therefore, represents the slow, cold type of
disease, characterized by feeble, ineffectual efforts to eliminate
the latent morbid taints and impediments from the system. These
efforts may take the form of open sores, skin eruptions, catarrhal
discharges, chronic diarrhea, etc.
If acute diseases are treated in harmony with Nature's laws, they
will leave the body in a purer, healthier condition. But if the
treatment is wrong, if under the "Old School" methods fever and
inflammation (Nature's methods of elimination) are checked and
suppressed with poisonous drugs, serums and antitoxins or if,
instead of purifying and invigorating cells and tissues, the
affected parts and organs are removed with the surgeon's knife,
Nature is not allowed to get rid of the disease matter, and the
poisonous taints and morbid encumbrances remain in the organism.
In this way originate the worst forms of chronic diseases which now
afflict civilized races.
The truth of this assertion is proved by the fact that chronic
diseases we know are rare among the primitive peoples of the earth,
such as the early indiginous people of Africa and Australia or the
Eskimos of the arctic regions. They are not found among people who
do not use drugs. All the different forms of venereal disease,
chronic rheumatism, chronic indigestion, etc., are unknown in those
countries whose inhabitants live in harmony with Nature. The reason
is that these people have not learned to suppress Nature's acute
purifying and healing efforts by poisonous drugs and surgical
operations.
The Cell
Let us now study the actual condition of the cells, tissues and
organs of the body in chronic disease.
We know that the human body is made up of billions of minute cells
of living protoplasm. Though these cells are so small that they have
to be magnified under the microscope several hundred times before we
can see them, they are independent living beings which are born,
grow, eat, drink, throw off waste matter, multiply, decline and die
just like the large conglomerate cell which we call Man.
Each one of these little cells has its own business to attend to,
whether it be assimilation, elimination, nervous activities and
functions, etc.
If these little beings are well individually, the man is well. If
they are starved or ailing, the entire man is similarly affected.
The whole depends upon the parts. In the human body as well as in a
nation or a city, the welfare of the entire community depends upon
the well-being of its individual members.
If governing bodies would realize and apply these truths, and pay
more attention to providing wholesome surroundings and proper
conditions of living for their subjects, to an adequate supply of
pure food and a normal combination of work and rest, instead of
concentrating their best efforts upon restrictive and punitive
measures (allopathic treatment), there would be no social problems
to solve.
It is our duty to provide the most favorable conditions of living
for the little cells that make up the individual human organism. If
we do that, there will be no occasion for disease. Natural immunity
will be the result.
Herein lies the vital difference between the attitude of Nature Cure
and that of the allopathic school toward disease. The latter spends
all its efforts in fighting the disease symptoms, while the former
confines itself to creating health conditions in the habits and
surroundings of the patient, from the standpoint that the disease
symptoms will then take care of themselves, that they will disappear
on account of nonsupport. It is the application of the injunction
"Resist not Evil" to the treatment of physical disease.
Under the influence of wrong habits of living and the suppressive
treatment of diseases, all forms of waste and morbid matter (the
feces of the cells), together with food, drink and drug poisons
accumulate in the system, affect the cells and obstruct the tiny
spaces (interstices) between them. These morbid encumbrances impinge
upon and clog the blood vessels, the nerve channels and the other
tissues of the body. This is bound to interfere with the normal
functions of the organism, and in time lead to deterioration and
organic destruction.
In this connection we wish to call attention to a difference in
viewpoint between the school of osteopathy and the Nature Cure
school. Osteopaths and chiropractors attribute disease almost
entirely to "impingement" (abnormal pressure) upon nerves and blood
vessels due to dislocations and subluxations of the vertebrae of the
spine and of other bony structures. They do not take into
consideration the impingement upon and obstruction of nerve channels
and blood vessels all through the system caused by local or general
encumbrances of the organism with waste matter, morbid products, and
poisons that have accumulated in cells and tissues.
The Life of the Cell
Every individual cell must be supplied with food and with oxygen.
These it receives from the red arterial blood. The cells must also
be provided with an outlet for their waste products. This is
furnished by the venous circulation, which represents the drainage
system of the body. If this drainage is defective, the effect upon
the organism is similar to the effect produced upon a house when the
excretions and discharges of its inhabitants are allowed to remain
in it.
Furthermore, every cell must be in unobstructed communication with
the nerve currents of the organism. Most important of all, it must
be in touch with the sympathetic nervous system through which it
receives the Life Force which vivifies and controls all involuntary
functions of the cells and organs in the human body.
Each individual cell must be supplied with nerve fibers which convey
its sensations and needs to headquarters, the nerve centers in brain
and spinal cord. Also, each cell must be connected with other nerve
filaments which carry impulses from the cranial, spinal and
sympathetic centers to the cell, governing and directing its
activities.
For instance, if the cell be hungry, thirsty, cold or in pain, it
telegraphs these sensations to headquarters in the brain or spinal
cord and from there directions necessary to comply with the needs of
the cell are sent forth in the form of nerve impulses to the centers
controlling the circulation, the food and heat supply, the means of
protection, etc.
This circuit of communication from the cell over the afferent nerves
to the nerve centers in the brain or spinal cord, and from these
centers over the efferent nerves back to the cell or to other cells
is called the reflex arc.
Let us use an illustration: Suppose the fingers come in close
contact with a hot iron. The cells in the finger tips experience a
sensation of burning pain. At once this sensation is telegraphed
over the afferent nerves to the nerve centers in the brain or spinal
cord. In response to this call of distress the command comes back
over the efferent nerve filaments: "Withdraw the fingers!" At the
same time the impulse to withdraw the fingers is sent over the motor
nerves to the muscles and ligaments which control the movements of
the hand.
If the means of communication between the different parts of the
organism are obstructed or cut off entirely, the individual cell is
bound to deteriorate and to die, just like a person lost in a barren
wilderness and cut off from his fellowmen must perish.
In warfare it is a well-known fact that if one of the contending
armies succeeds in cutting off the telegraphic communication of the
other army with its headquarters, the activities of that other army
are seriously handicapped. So the waste materials in the system, the
disease taints, narcotic and alcoholic poisons, etc., obstruct the
nerve passages, and thus interfere with the functions of the cell by
cutting off its means of communication.
What has been said will serve to elucidate and emphasize the
necessity of perfect cleanliness, inside as well as outside of the
body. It justifies the dictum of Kuhne, the apostle of Nature Cure:
"Cleanliness is Health." Anything that in any way interferes with or
obstructs the circulation of vital fluids and nerve currents in the
system is bound to create the abnormal conditions and functions
which constitute disease.
When the morbid encumbrances and obstructions in the organism have
reached the point where they seriously interfere with the
nourishment, drainage and nerve supply of the cells, the latter
cannot perform their activities properly, nor can they rid
themselves of the impediment. They may be compared to people who are
forced to live in bad, unwholesome surroundings and who cannot do
their best work under these unfavorable conditions from which they
cannot escape.
In this way originates chronic disease, which means that the cells
have become incapable of arousing themselves to acute eliminative
effort in the form of inflammatory febrile reactions.
In my lectures I sometimes liken the cell thus encumbered with
morbid matter and poisons to a man buried in a mine under the debris
of a cave in such a manner that it is impossible for him to free
himself of the earth and timbers which are pinning him down. In such
a predicament the man is unable to help himself. His fellow workers
or his friends must come to his aid and remove the obstructing
masses until he can assist them and free himself.
This is a good illustration of the condition of the cells of the
body in chronic disease. They also have become unable to help
themselves and need assistance until they can once more arouse
themselves to self-help by means of an acute eliminative effort.
What can we do to help them? We must endeavor in the first place to
furnish the cells with the right nourishment. We must abstain from
everything that may be injurious to the body in food and drink, so
as to relieve the cells of all unnecessary work.
Whatever one may think of vegetarianism as a continuous mode of
living, a little consideration will make it plain that a rational
vegetarian diet is the ~sine qua non~ in the cure of chronic
diseases. It builds up the blood on a normal basis, excludes all
food and drink poisons and thereby gives the organism an opportunity
to throw off the old accumulations of waste and morbid materials.
In chronic disease, every drop of blood and every cell of the
organism is affected. In order to produce a cure, the old tissues
must be broken down and removed and new tissues built up. The more
thorough the change in diet, the greater and more rapid will be the
changes for the better in cells and tissues, especially if only pure
and eliminating foods are used.
For these reasons it is advisable to omit most red-blooded meat
while under the natural treatment. All animal flesh contains the
morbid secretions and other waste products of the animal organism,
and this means additional work for the cells already overburdened
with systemic poisons.
Then we must work for elimination. Cold water applied to the surface
of the body is the most powerful stimulant to the circulation. It
actually pumps and pushes the blood through the system. One feels
the blood rushing through the arteries and veins with greater force.
The cold-water treatment makes the skin more alive and active, stirs
up and accelerates the circulation throughout the system and thus
promotes the elimination of systemic poisons through the skin.
This stimulating effect of cold water upon the organism has been
proved by counting the number of red blood corpuscles in a drop of
blood before and after the application of the cold "blitzguss." They
were found to have doubled in number. That does not mean that in an
instant again as many red blood corpuscles had come into existence,
but it does mean that before the cold "guss" one-half of them were
dozing lazily in the corners. The cold water stirred them up, forced
them into the circulation, made them travel and attend to business.
Another powerful means to promote elimination is thorough,
systematic massage. The kneading, rolling, twisting and clapping
actually squeezes the stagnant morbid matter and the waste products
out of the tissues into the circulation, to be carried off through
the venous drainage and allows the red blood with its nourishment
and fresh supply of oxygen to flood the cells and organs.
Massage is also very effective as a means of regulating the blood
supply in the system. In every chronic disease there is obstruction
or congestion in some part of the organism, causing high blood
pressure in the interior of the body and insufficient blood supply
to the external parts, especially the extremities. Massage
distributes the blood quickly and evenly.
Of great importance is osteopathy. All dislocations, luxations and
subluxations of bones and ligaments should be corrected by expert
manipulation. As a matter of fact, hardly a person can be found
today whose spine is not abnormal in one way or another, just as
there is hardly a single normal human eye [as far as iridology
markings are concerned].
Manipulative treatment adjusts the lesions of the spine and other
bony structures, thus removing abnormal pressure upon the nerves and
blood vessels and establishing a free and abundant flow of nerve and
blood currents.
Air and light baths, by stimulating the skin in a natural manner to
increased activity, also contribute to the attainment of the various
good results just described.
Next comes physical exercise. Corrective and curative movements
combined with deep breathing promote the combustion (oxidation) of
morbid materials and in this way facilitate their elimination from
the system.
Life itself is dependent upon breathing. The Life Force enters the
body with every breath we draw. Show me a man with well-developed,
full-breathing lungs, and I will show you a man with good vitality.
Last but not least among the natural methods of treating the cell in
chronic disease we mention the right mental and emotional attitude.
Fear, anxiety and all kindred emotions congeal the nerve matter and
thereby shut off the supply of nerve force. The cells and tissues
starve and freeze. On the other hand, the emotions of hope,
confidence and cheerfulness relax and open blood vessels and nerve
channels and allow the free and unobstructed inflow and circulation
of vital energy.
The different methods of natural treatment and their practical
application in chronic diseases will be discussed in detail in
subsequent chapters.
When through natural methods of living and of treatment the morbid
encumbrances have been removed sufficiently to provide and maintain
normal blood supply, better venous drainage and the unobstructed
flow of the nerve currents, when lesions of the bony structures have
been corrected by skilful adjustment, and when, through right mental
attitude, a free and abundant inflow of Life Force has been
established, then the cells and tissues of the body become once
again able to arouse themselves to an acute eliminative effort, and
the organism is ready for a healing crisis.
Chapter XX
Crises
Crisis in the ordinary sense of the word means change, either for
better or for worse. In its relation to medicine, the term "crisis"
has been defined as "a decisive change in the disease, resulting
either in recovery or in death."
We of the Nature Cure school distinguish between healing crises and
disease crises, according to the character and the tendency of the
acute reaction. If an acute disease is brought about through the
accumulation of morbid matter or the invasion of disease germs to
such an extent that the health or the life of the organism is
endangered, in other words, if the disease conditions are forcing
the crises, we speak of disease crises.
But if acute reactions take place in the system because conditions
have become more normal, because the healing forces have gained the
ascendancy and forced the acute inflammatory processes, we call them
healing crises.
Healing crises are simply different forms of elimination by means of
which Nature endeavors to remove the latent, chronic disease
encumbrance from the system. The most common forms of these acute
purifications are colds, catarrhal and hemorrhoidal discharges,
boils, ulcers, abscesses, open sores, skin eruptions, diarrheas,
etc.
Healing crises and disease crises may seem very much alike. Patients
often tell me: "I have had this before. I call it an ordinary boil
(or cold, or fever)."
That may be true. The former disease crisis and the present healing
crisis may be similar in their outward manifestations. But they are
taking place under entirely different conditions.
When the organism is loaded to the danger point with morbid matter,
it may arouse itself in self-defense to an acute eliminative effort
in the shape of cold, catarrh, fever, inflammation, skin eruption,
etc. In these instances, the disease conditions bring about the
crisis and the organism is on the defensive. These are disease
crises.
Such unequal struggles between the healing forces and disease
conditions sometimes end favorably and sometimes unfavorably.
On the other hand, healing crises develop because the healing forces
are in the ascendancy and take the offensive. They are brought about
through the natural methods of living and of treatment and always
result in improved conditions.
A simple allegory may assist me in explaining the difference between
a healing crisis and a disease crisis:
For years a prizefighter holds the championship because he keeps
himself in perfect physical condition and before every contest
spends many weeks in careful training. When he faces his opponent in
the ring, he has eliminated from his organism as much waste matter
and superfluous flesh and fat as possible by a strictly regulated
diet and a great deal of hard exercise. As a consequence, he comes
off victorious in every contest and easily maintains his
superiority.
These victories in his career, like healing crises in the organism,
are the result of training and preparation.
The prizefighter in the one case and Vital Force in the other are on
the offensive from the beginning of the struggle and have the best
of the fight from start to finish.
Rendered overconfident by long-continued success, our champion
gradually permits himself to drift into a weakened physical
condition. He omits his regular training and indulges in all kinds
of dissipation.
One day, full of self-conceit and underestimating the strength of
his challenger, he enters the ring without preparation and is
ingloriously defeated by a man who, under different circumstances,
would not be a match for him.
So, in the case of a patient in a disease crisis, fatal termination
may be due to the excessive accumulation of waste and morbid matter
in the system, to lowered vitality and to lack of preparation.
Victory or defeat in acute reactions as well as in the ring depends
on right living and preparatory training.
In the healing crisis, vitality is the stronger and gains the
victory in the struggle; in the disease crisis, disease conditions
have gained the ascendancy and may bring about the defeat of the
healing forces.
Under conditions favorable to human life, a body of normal
structure, healthy blood and tissues and good vitality cannot be
affected by acute disease. Such an organism is practically immune to
all forms of inflammatory febrile reactions. These always indicate
that there is something wrong in the system which Nature is trying
to correct or get rid of.
Healing Crises
In Chapter Two "Catechism of Nature Cure," we defined healing
crises as follows: "A healing crisis is an acute reaction, resulting
from the ascendancy of Nature's healing forces over disease
conditions. Its tendency is toward recovery, and it is, therefore,
in conformity with Nature's constructive principle." The possibility
of producing healing crises and thereby curing chronic ailments
depends upon the following conditions:
The patient must possess sufficient vital energy and powers of
reaction to respond to the natural treatment and to a change of
habits. The destruction and disorganization of vital fluids and
organs must not have advanced too far.
Some patients become frightened at the idea of crises. They exclaim:
"I came here to get well, not to grow worse."
However, there is no occasion for alarm. Healing crises occur in
mild form only because, under the influence of natural living and
treatment, Nature has the best of the fight. The healing forces of
the organism have gained the ascendancy over the disease conditions.
In fact, Nature never undertakes a healing crisis until the system
has been prepared for it, until the organism is sufficiently
purified and strengthened to conduct the acute reaction to a
favorable termination.
Furthermore, it is well to remember that crises cannot be avoided,
because it is through fevers and inflammatory processes that Nature
effects the cure--that she tears down the old to build up the new.
On the other hand, if patients are possessed of exceptionally good
vitality and if the organs of elimination are in good working order,
the purification and adjustment of the organism may occasionally
proceed gradually without the occurrence of marked acute reactions
or crises.
Healing Crises, When Properly Conducted,
Are Never Fatal to Life
When well assisted by the right, natural methods of living and of
treatment, healing crises are never dangerous or fatal to life. The
only danger lies in suppressing these acute reactions by drugs,
knife, the ice bag or any means whatever.
If acute reactions are suppressed, the constructive healing crisis
may be changed into a destructive disease crisis. Therefore we
earnestly warn our patients never to interfere in any way with a
healing crisis lest the chronic condition (which resulted from the
suppression of the original disease) become worse than before.
When Nature, with all the force inherent in the human organism, has
finally worked up to the point of a healing crisis, another defeat
by a new suppression may be beyond her powers of endurance and
recuperation. Fatal collapse may then be the result.
Therefore, take heed! If you are not willing to endure the healing
crises, do not undertake the treatment. When you have conjured up
the hidden demons of disease, you must have the courage to face and
subdue them. Nothing good in life comes to us except as we pay the
price. He who is too cowardly to conquer in a healing crisis may
perish in a disease crisis.
Drugs Versus Healing Crises
Our explanations of the natural laws of cure and of natural
therapeutics are often greeted by "Old School" physicians and
students with remarks like the following:
"You speak as if you had the monopoly of eliminative treatment and
of the production of crises. With our laxatives, cathartics,
diuretics, diaphoretics and tonics, we are doing the same thing.
What is more effectual for stimulating a sluggish liver and
cleansing the intestinal tract than calomel followed by a dose of
salts? What will produce more profuse perspiration than pilocarpin;
or what is a better stimulus to the kidneys than squills or buchu?
Can we not by means of stimulants and depressants regulate heart
action to a nicety?
"We accomplish all this in a clean, scientific manner, without
resorting to unpleasant dieting and to barbarous applications of
douches, packs and manual treatments. Isn't it more dignified and
professional to write a Latin prescription? How much better the
impression on the laity than soaking and rubbing!"
Let us see if these statements are true, if laxation, urination or
perspiration produced by poisonous drugs are identical in character
and in effect with the elimination produced by natural living and
natural methods of treatment through healing crises.
Mercury, in the form of calomel, is one of the best-known
cholagogues [an agent designed to increase the flow of bile and,
thereby, stimulate lower bowel action, ~ed.~]. It is the favorite
laxative and cathartic of allopathy. The prevailing idea is that
calomel acts on the liver and the intestines; but in reality these
organs act on the drug.
All laxatives and cathartics are poisons; if it were not so, they
would not produce their peculiar, drastic effects. Because they are
poisons, Nature tries to eliminate them from the system as quickly
and as thoroughly as possible. In order to do this, the excretory
glands and membranes of the liver and the digestive tract greatly
increase the amount of their secretions and thereby produce a forced
evacuation of the intestinal canal.
Thus the system, in the effort to eliminate the mercurial poison,
expels also the other contents of the intestines. This may effect a
temporary cleansing of the intestinal tract, but it does not and
cannot cleanse the individual cells throughout the body of their
impurities.
The Lasting Effects of Artificial Purging
In accordance with the Law of Action and Reaction, action and
reaction are equal and opposite; the temporary irritation and
overstimulation of the sensitive membranes of the digestive organs
are followed by corresponding weakness and exhaustion, and if this
procedure be repeated and become habitual, by gradual atrophy and
paralysis. As atrophy progresses, the dose of the purgative must be
increased in order to accomplish the desired result and this, in its
turn, hastens the degenerative changes in the system.
Such enforced, artificial purging may flush the drains and sewers,
but does not cleanse the chambers of the house. The cells in the
interior tissues remain encumbered with morbid matter. A genuine and
truly effective housecleaning must start in the cells and must be
brought about through the initiative of the vital energies in the
organism, through healing crises, and not through stimulation by
means of poisonous irritants.
When, under a natural regimen of living and of treatment, the system
has been sufficiently purified, adjusted and vivified, the cells
themselves begin the work of elimination.
This is what takes place: The morbid matter and poisons thrown off
by the cells and tissues are carried by means of the venous
circulation to the organs of elimination, the bowels, kidneys, lungs
and skin, and to the mucous membranes lining the interior tracts,
such as the nasal passages, the throat and bronchi, the digestive
and genitourinary canals, etc.
These organs of elimination become overcrowded with the rush of
morbid matter and the accompanying congestion and irritation cause
the acute inflammatory processes and feverish symptoms
characterizing the various forms of colds, catarrhs, skin eruptions,
diarrheas, boils and other acute forms of elimination, which we call
healing crises. In other words, what the "Old School" of medicine
calls the disease, we look upon as the Cure.
Acute elimination brought about in this manner is Nature's method of
housecleaning. It is a true healing crisis, the result of
purification and increased activity from within the cell, produced
by natural means.
Here interposes Friend Allopath: "You claim that you bring about
your acute reactions by natural means only, and that these are never
injurious to the organism. What difference does it make if the
circulation is stimulated and elimination increased by a cold-water
spray or by digitalis? The cold-water stimulation produces a
reaction just as digitalis does, and the one must therefore be as
injurious as the other."
To this we reply: "The stimulating effect on heart and circulation
produced by digitalis is the first action of a highly poisonous
drug; the second lasting effect is weakening and paralyzing. On the
other hand, the first action of a cold-water spray is depressing; it
sends the blood into the interior of the body and benumbs the
surface. The sensory nerves at once report this sensation of cold to
headquarters in the brain, and immediately the command is
telegraphed to the blood vessels in the interior of the body: 'Send
blood to the surface!' As a result, the blood is carried to the
surface, and the skin becomes warm and rosy with the glow of life.
In this case the stimulation is the second and lasting effect of the
water treatment, from which there is no further reaction."
Similarly, the stimulation produced by exercise, massage,
manipulation or the exposure of the nude body to light and air is
natural stimulation, produced by harmless, natural means. It is
entirely due to the fact that conditions in the system have been
made more normal, as explained in other chapters.
Drugs, stimulants and tonics, while they produce an artificial,
temporary stimulation, do not change the underlying abnormal
conditions in the organism. Likewise, the flushing of the colon with
water, the use of laxative herb teas and decoctions or forced
sweating by means of Turkish or Russian baths, though not as
dangerous as inorganic minerals and poisonous drugs, cannot be
classed among the natural means of cure. These agents, which by many
persons are looked upon as natural treatment, irritate the organs of
elimination to forced, abnormal activity without at the same time
arousing the cells in the interior of the body to natural
elimination.
Dr. H. Lahmann, one of the foremost scientists of the Nature Cure
movement, made a series of interesting experiments. His chemists
gathered the natural perspiration of certain patients, produced by
ordinary exercise in the sunshine. These excretions of the skin were
evaporated and analyzed, and were found to contain poisons powerful
enough to kill rabbits.
If profuse sweating was produced in the same patients by the high
temperature of the hot-air box or the electric-light cabinet, their
perspiration, when evaporated and analyzed, was found to contain
only small amounts of toxins. Thus Dr. Lahmann proved that:
Sweating and the elimination of disease matter are two different
processes. Artificially induced sweating does not eliminate disease
matter. The organism cannot be forced by irritants and stimulants
and artificial means, but eliminates morbid matter only in its own
natural manner and when it is in proper condition to do so.
In a lesser degree, this applies also to fasting. Under certain
conditions it becomes a necessity; but it may easily be abused and
overdone.
Do We Never Fail?
Certainly we fail, but our failures are usually due to the fact that
sick people, as a rule, do not consider Nature Cure except as a last
resort. The methods and requirements of Nature Cure appear at first
so unusual and exacting that people seek to evade them so long as
they have the least faith in the miracle-working power of the poison
bottle, a metaphysical healer or the surgeon's knife. When health,
wealth and hope are entirely exhausted, then the chronic sufferer
grasps at Nature Cure as a drowning man clutches at a straw. But
even though ninety percent of these cases which come to us are of
the apparently incurable type, our total failures are few and far
between.
If there is sufficient vitality in the body to react to natural
treatment and if the destruction of vital parts and organs has not
too far advanced, a cure is possible. Often the seemingly hopeless
cases yield the most readily.
Our success is due to the fact that we do not rely on any one method
of treatment, but combine in our work everything that is good in the
different systems of natural healing.
The Law of Crises
Everywhere in nature and in the world of men we find the Law of
Crises in evidence. This proves it to be a universal law, ruling all
cosmic relations and activities.
Wars and revolutions are the healing crises in the life of nations.
Heresies and reformations are the crises of religion. In strikes,
riots and panics, we recognize the crises of commercial life.
Staid old Mother Earth herself has in the hoary past repeatedly
changed the configurations of her continents and oceans by great
cataclysms or geological crises.
When the sultry summer air has become pregnant with poisonous vapors
and miasmas, atmospheric crises, such as rainstorms, thunder,
lightning and electric storms, cool and purify the air and charge it
anew with life-giving ozone. In like manner will healing crises
purify the disease-laden bodies of men.
Emanuel Swedenborg gives us a wonderful description of the Law of
Crises in its relationship to the regeneration of the soul. We quote
from the chapter in which he describes the working of this law,
entitled, "Regeneration Is Effected by Combats in Temptation."
"They who have not been instructed concerning the regeneration of
man think that man can be regenerated without temptation. But it is
to be known that no one is regenerated without temptation; and that
many temptations succeed, one after another. The reason is that
regeneration is effected for an end, in order that the life of the
old man may die, and the new life which is heavenly be insinuated.
It is evident, therefore, that there must be a conflict [healing
crisis--~author's note ~]; for the life of the old man resists and
determines not to be extinguished; and the life of the new man can
only enter where the life of the old is extinct.
"Whoever thinks from an enlightened rationale, may see and perceive
from this that a man cannot be regenerated without combat, that is,
without spiritual temptations; and further, that he is not
regenerated by one temptation, but by many. For there are very many
kinds of evil which formed the delight of his former life, that is,
of the old life. These evils cannot all be subdued at once and
together; for they cleave tenaciously, since they have been inrooted
in the parents for many ages back [the scrofula of the
soul--~author's note~ ] and are therefore innate in man, and are
confirmed by actual evils from himself from infancy. All these evils
are diametrically opposite to the celestial good [perfect
health--~author's note~ ] that is to be insinuated and which is to
constitute the New Life."
Thus the inspired Seer of the North draws a vivid picture of what we
call healing crises in their relation to moral regeneration.
We cannot help recognizing the close agreement of physical and
spiritual crises; this, again, demonstrates the continuity and exact
correspondence of Natural Law on the different planes of being. [The
Law of Hermes: ~As above, so below; as in the inner, so in the
outer; as in the lesser, so in the greater.~]
We of the Nature Cure school know that this great Law of Crises
dominates the cure of chronic disease. Every case is another
verification of it; in fact, every decided advance on the road to
perfect health is marked by acute reactions.
The cure invariably proceeds through the darkness and chaos of the
crises to the light and beauty of perfect health, periods of marked
improvement alternating with acute eliminating activity (the
"spiritual temptations" and "combats" of Swedenborg), until perfect
regeneration has taken place.
Chapter XXI
Periodicity
In many forms of acute disease, crises develop with marked
regularity and in well-defined periodicity. This phenomenon has been
observed and described by many physicians.
It is not so well known, however, that in the cure of chronic
diseases also, crises develop in accordance with certain laws of
periodicity.
Periodicity is governed by the Septimal Law or Law of Sevens, which
seems to be the basic law governing the vibratory activities of the
planetary universe.
The harmonics of heat, light, sound, electricity, magnetism and of
atomic structure and arrangement run in scales of seven.
The Law of Sevens governs the days of the week, the phases of the
moon and the menstrual periods of the woman. Every observing
physician is aware of its influence on feverish, nervous and psychic
diseases.
The Law of Sevens dominates the life of individuals and of nations
and of everything that lives and has periods of birth, growth,
fruitage and decline.
Over two thousand years ago Pythagoras and Hippocrates distinctly
recognized and proclaimed the Law of Crises in its bearing on the
cure of chronic diseases. They taught that alternating, well-defined
periods of improvement and of crises were determined and governed by
the law of periodicity and by the law of numbers (the Septimal Law).
The following quotations are taken from the ~Encyclopedia
Britannica,~ Vol. XV, p. 800:
"But this artistic completeness was closely connected with 'the
third cardinal virtue' of Hippocratic medicine--the clear
recognition of disease as being equally with life a process governed
by what we should now call natural laws, which could be known by
observation and which indicated the spontaneous and normal direction
of recovery, by following which alone could the physician succeed.
"Another Hippocratic doctrine, the influence of which is not even
yet exhausted, is that of the healing power of Nature. Not that
Hippocrates taught, as he was afterwards reproached with teaching,
that Nature is sufficient for the cure of diseases; for he held
strongly the efficacy of art. But he recognized, at least in acute
diseases, a natural process which the humours went through--being
first of all crude, then passing through coction or digestion, and
finally being expelled by resolution or crisis through one of the
natural channels of the body. The duty of the physician was to
foresee these changes, 'to assist or not to hinder them,' so that
'the sick man might conquer the disease with the help of the
physician.' The times at which crises were to be expected were
naturally looked for with anxiety; and it was a cardinal point in
the Hippocratic system to foretell them with precision. Hippocrates,
influenced as is thought by the Pythagorean doctrine of numbers,
taught that they were to be expected on days fixed by certain
numerical rules, in some cases on odd, in others on even
numbers--the celebrated doctrine of 'critical days.' It follows from
what has been said that prognosis, or the art of foretelling the
course and event of the disease, was a strong point with the
Hippocratic physicians. In this perhaps they have never been
excelled. Diagnosis, or recognition of the disease, must have been
necessarily imperfect, when no scientific nosology, or system of
disease* existed, and the knowledge of anatomy was quite inadequate
to allow of a precise determination of the seat of disease; but
symptoms were no doubt observed and interpreted skilfully. The pulse
is not spoken of in any of the works now attributed to Hippocrates
himself, though it is mentioned in other works of the collection."
*The author of this article in the Encyclopedia Britannica does not
see that it is the modern [then as now] orthodox "scientific
nosology, or system of disease" which obscures the simplicity and
precision of the Hippocratic philosophy of disease and cure.
"In the treatment of disease, the Hippocratic school attached great
importance to diet, the variations necessary in different diseases
being minutely defined. In chronic cases diet, exercises and
natural methods were chiefly relied upon."
These wonderful truths, with other wisdom of the ancients, were lost
in the spiritual darkness of the Middle Ages. Modern medicine looks
upon these claims and teachings of the Hippocratic School as
"superstition without any foundation in fact." However, the great
sages of antiquity, drawing upon a source of ancient wisdom, deeply
hidden from the self-satisfied scribes and wise men of the schools,
after all, proclaimed the truth.
Every case of chronic disease properly treated by natural methods
proves the reality and stability of the Law of Crises. It is
therefore a standing wonder and surprise to one who knows, that this
all-important and self-evident law is practically unknown to the
disciples of the regular schools.
The Law of Sevens
In accordance with the Law of Periodicity, the sixth period in any
seven periods is marked by reactions, changes, revolutions or
crises. It is, therefore, looked upon by popular intuition as an
unlucky period. Friday, the sixth day of the week, is regarded as an
unlucky day; Friday is hangman's day; according to tradition the
Master, Jesus, was crucified on Friday.
Counting from the first sixth or Friday period in any given number
of hours, days, weeks, months, years or groups of years, as the case
may be, every succeeding seventh period is characterized by crises.
This explains why 13 is considered an unlucky number. It represents
the second critical or Friday period.
However, there is really no cause for this superstitious fear of
Friday and the number 13. It is due to a lack of understanding of
Nature's Laws. By intelligent cooperation with these laws we may
turn the critical periods in our lives into healing crises and
beneficial changes.
We should not fear the crises periods of the larger life and the
changes in our outward circumstances which they may bring any more
than we should fear crises in the physical body.
A thorough understanding of the nature and purpose of healing crises
in acute and chronic diseases has taught me the nature and purpose
of evil in general. It has made me understand more clearly the
meaning of "Resist not Evil" and of the saying: "We are punished by
our sins, not for our sins." It has shown me that evil is not a
punishment or a curse, but a necessary complement of good, that it
is corrective and educational in its purposes, that it remains with
us only as long as we need its salutary lessons.
The evil of physical disease is not due to accident or to the
arbitrary rulings of a capricious Providence, nor is it always
"error of mortal mind." From the Nature Cure philosophy and its
practical applications we have learned that, barring accidents and
conditions or surroundings unfavorable to human life, it is caused
in every instance by violations of the physical laws of our being.
So the social, political and industrial evil of the larger life is
brought about by violations of the law in the respective domains of
life and action.
So long as transgressions of the physical laws of our being result
in hereditary and acquired disease encumbrances, we must expect
reactions which may become either disease crises or healing crises.
Likewise, so long as ignorance, selfishness and self-indulgence
continue to create evil in other domains of life, we must expect
there also the occurrence of crises, of reaction and revolution.
When knowledge, self-control and altruism become the sole motives of
action, evil and the crises it necessitates will naturally
disappear.
Therefore, we should not be afraid of changes and crises periods but
cooperate with them clear-eyed and strong-willed. Then they will
result in improvement and further growth.
Life is growth, and growth is change. The only death is stagnation.
The loss of friends, home or fortune may seem for the time being an
overwhelming calamity; but if met in the right spirit, such losses
will prove stepping-stones to greater opportunity and higher
achievement.
Many of our patients formerly looked upon their diseased condition
as a great misfortune and an undeserved punishment; but since it
brought them in contact with the Nature Cure philosophy and showed
them the necessity of complying with the laws of their being, they
now look upon the former evil as the greatest blessing in their
lives, because it taught them how to become the masters of fate
instead of remaining the plaything of Nature's destructive forces.
Why should we fear even the greatest of all crises, physical death,
when it, also, is only the gateway to a larger life, greater
opportunities and more beautiful surroundings? Why should we mourn
and grieve over the death of friends and relatives, when they have
only emigrated to another, better country?
Suppose we ourselves had to enter upon the great journey today or
tomorrow, shouldn't we be glad to meet some of our friends on the
other side and to be welcomed, advised and guided by them in the new
surroundings?
Therefore we should not fear, nor endeavor to avoid the crises in
any and all domains of life and action, but meet them and cooperate
with them fearlessly and intelligently. They then will always make
for greater opportunity and higher accomplishment.
The Law of Sevens Applied to Individual Life
Applied to the life of the individual, the Law of Periodicity
manifests itself as follows:
Human life on the earth plane is divided into periods of seven
years. The first seven years represent the period of infancy. With
the next seven, the years of childhood, begins individual
responsibility, the conscious discernment between right and wrong.
The third group comprises the years of adolescence; the fourth marks
the attainment of full growth. Nearly all civilized countries take
cognizance of this fact by fixing the legal age at twenty-one.
The twenty-eighth year, the beginning of the fifth period, is
another milestone along the road to development.
The sixth period, beginning at the age of thirty-five and ending at
forty-two, is marked by reactions, changes and crises. It may,
therefore, seem an unlucky period; but if we understand the law and
comply with it, we shall be better and stronger in every way after
we have passed this period.
During the seventh period, the effects of the sixth or crises period
continue and adjust themselves. It is a period of reconstruction, of
recuperation and rest, and thus the best preparation for a new cycle
of sevens which begins with the fiftieth year.**
**Those who are interested in the Law of Periodicity as applied to
life in general, will find much valuable information in a book
entitled ~Periodicity~ by J. R. Buchanan, M.D., published by the
Kosmos Publishing Co., 2112 Sherman Ave., Evanston, Il.
In this connection it is interesting to note that the Mosaic law
recognized the law of periodicity and fixed upon Sunday as the first
day or "birthday" of the week, and upon Saturday (the Sabbath) as
the last or "rest" day, in which to prepare for another period of
seven days.
Orthodox science now admits that the normal length of human life
should be about one hundred and fifty years. This would constitute
three cycles of forty-nine years each, the first corresponding to
youth, the second to maturity, and the third to fruition.
The Law of Sevens in Febrile Diseases
If we apply the Laws of Periodicity to the course of acute febrile
or inflammatory diseases, we find that the sixth day from the
beginning of the first well-defined symptom marks the first
Friday-period or the first crisis of the disease, and that every
seventh day thereafter is also distinguished by aggravations and
changes, either for better or for worse.
The Law of Sevens in Chronic Diseases
Applied to the cure of chronic diseases under the influence of
natural methods of living and of treatment, the Laws of Crises and
of Periodicity manifest as follows:
When a chronic patient, whose chances of cure are good, is placed
under proper (natural) conditions of living and of treatment he
will, as a rule, experience five weeks of marked improvement.
The sixth week, if conditions are favorable, usually marks the
beginning of acute reactions or healing crises. This means that the
healing forces of the organism have grown strong enough to begin the
work of acute elimination.
By all sorts of acute reactions, such as skin eruptions, diarrheas,
feverish, inflammatory and catarrhal conditions, boils, abscesses,
mucopurulent discharges, etc., Nature now endeavors to remove the
latent, chronic disease taints from the system.
The character of the healing crises and the time of their occurrence
in any given case can often be accurately predicted by means of the
Diagnosis from the Eye (see Chapter XIII), from Nature's records in
the iris.
But the best of all methods of diagnosis is the cure iself, because
weak spots and morbid taints in the organism are revealed through
the healing crises.
The Same Old Aches and Pains
Frequently we hear from a patient in the throes of crises: "These
are the same old aches and pains that I had before. It is exactly
the same trouble I have been suffering with for many years. This is
not a crisis!--I have caught a cold, or I have eaten something which
does not agree with me."
The patient has forgotten what we taught him regarding the Law of
Crises. He loses sight of the fact that healing crises are nothing
more or less than a coming-up-again of old disease conditions, an
acute manifestation of ailments which had become chronic through
neglect or suppression.
Of course they are "the same old aches and pains." Nature Cure does
not create new diseases. Crises mean the stirring up and eliminating
of hereditary and acquired taints and poisons. Under the right
methods of treatment, any previous disease condition suppressed by
drugs or knife or by mental effort may recur as a healing crisis.
They are the same old aches and pains which so often gave trouble in
the past, but they are now running their course under different
conditions because the patient is now living in harmony with
Nature's Laws.
Under the natural regimen, Nature is encouraged and assisted in her
cleansing and healing efforts. She is allowed in her own wise way to
tear down the old and build up the new.
The "Old Schools" of healing proclaim Mother Nature a poor healer.
But we of the Nature Cure school believe that the wisdom which
created this wonderful, complex mechanism which we call the human
body knows also how to preserve and to repair it. Every healing
crisis passed under natural conditions assisted by natural methods
of treatment leaves the body purified and strengthened and nearer to
perfect health.
Our critics and opponents frequently ask us how we know that our
methods are natural and in harmony with Nature's laws.
To this we reply: The timely appearance of healing crises, their
orderly development and favorable termination constitute the best
criterion of the correctness and naturalness of the methods of
treatment employed. The prompt arrival and beneficial results of
acute reactions are a certain indication that the healing forces of
the organism are in the ascendancy and that the treatment is in
conformity with the natural laws of cure and with the constructive
principle in Nature.
Another question sometimes asked of us is: "Do healing crises
develop in every chronic disease under natural treatment?" Our
answer is: If the condition of the patient is not favorable to a
cure, that is, if the vitality is too low and the destruction of
vital parts too far advanced, the healing crises may be
proportionately delayed or may not occur at all. In such cases the
disease symptoms will increase in severity and complexity and become
more destructive instead of more constructive, until the final fatal
crisis. The end may come quickly, or the patient may decline
gradually toward the fatal termination.
Again, patients ask us: "Through how many crises shall I have to
pass?" We tell them: Just as many as you need; no more, no less. So
long as there is anything wrong in the system, crises will come and
go; but each crisis, if successfully passed, is another milestone on
the road to perfect health.
It is intensely interesting to observe how orderly and intelligently
Nature proceeds in her work of healing and repair. One problem after
another is taken up and adjusted.
First of all, the digestive organs are put into better condition,
because further progress depends upon proper assimilation and
elimination. The bowels must act freely and naturally before any
permanent improvement can take place. A treatment which fails to
accomplish this first preliminary improvement will surely fail to
produce more important results.
In this connection it is a significant fact that nearly all our
patients, when they come under our care, are suffering from very
stubborn constipation in spite of (or possibly on account of)
lifelong drugging. Neither medicines nor operations had given them
anything but temporary relief and the trouble had grown worse
instead of better.
If the "Old School" methods of treatment were not successful in
relieving simple constipation, what else can they be expected to
cure, since the overcoming of constipation is evidently the primary
necessity for any other improvement?
A system of treatment which cannot accomplish this cannot accomplish
anything else. It is strange, therefore, that a school of medicine
which has not succeeded, with all its vaunted knowledge and wisdom,
to cure simple constipation, flatly denies that natural methods can
cure cancer, epilepsy, locomotor ataxy and other so-called incurable
diseases.
Our Greatest Difficulty
The greatest difficulty in our work lies in conducting our patients
safely through the stormy crises periods. The first, preliminary
improvement is often so marked that the patient believes himself
already cured. He will say: "Doctor, I am feeling fine! There is
nothing the matter with me any more! I cannot understand why I
shouldn't go home and continue the natural regimen there!"
This feeling of mental elation and physical well-being is usually
the sign that the first general improvement has progressed far
enough to prepare the system for a healing crisis. Therefore my
answer to the overconfident patient may be something like this:
"Remember what I told you. The first improvement is not the cure, it
is only the preparation for the real fight. Look out! In a few days
you may whistle another tune."
And sure enough, usually within a few days after such a conversation
the patient is down in the slough of despond. His digestive organs
are in a wretched condition. He is nauseated, his tongue is coated,
he is suffering from headache and from a multitude of other symptoms
according to his individual condition. In fact, many of the old
aches and pains which he thought already cured come up again with
renewed force.
Healing crises, representing radical changes in the system, are
always accompanied by physical and mental weakness, because every
bit of vitality is drawn upon in these reconstructive processes. The
entire organism is shaken up to its very foundation; deep-seated,
chronic disease taints are being stirred up throughout the system.
The eliminative processes of the healing crises are often
accompanied by great mental depression and a feeling of strong
revulsion to the natural regimen and everything connected with it.
The patient thinks that, after all, Nature Cure is not for him, that
he is growing worse instead of better. In proportion to the severity
of the changes going on within him, he becomes disheartened and
despondent. Often he exhibits all the mental and emotional symptoms
of homesickness. In these critical days it requires all our powers
of persuasion to keep the depressed and discouraged patient from
giving up the fight and from taking something to relieve his
distress. He insists that "something must be done for him," and
cannot understand how he will ever get out of his "awful condition"
without some good strong medicine.
If our patients were not continually and thoroughly instructed
regarding the Laws of Crises and of Periodicity and if we did not
strongly advise and encourage them to persevere with the treatment,
few of them would hold out during these critical periods.
This explains why so many people fail to be cured and it also
explains why natural living and self-treatment often do not meet
with the desired results if carried on without the instruction and
guidance of a competent, experienced Nature Cure physician.
So long as the improvement continues, everything is lovely and hope
soars high. But when the inevitable crises arrive, the sufferer
believes that, after all, he made a mistake in taking up the natural
regimen, especially so when friends and relatives do their best to
destroy his confidence in the natural methods of cure by ridicule
and dire prophesies of failure.
Frightened and discouraged, the patient returns to the "flesh-pots
of Egypt" and to the good old pills and potions and ever afterwards
he tells his friends that "he tried Nature Cure and the vegetarian
diet, but it was no good."
Mother Nature remains a "book sealed with seven seals" to those who
mistrust, despise and counteract her, who rely on man-made wisdom
and the ever-changing theories and dogmas of the schools.
But on the other hand, every crisis conducted to a successful
termination in accordance with Nature's laws becomes an inspiration
to him who follows her guidance and assists her with intelligent
effort and loving care.
Chapter XXII
What About The "Chronic"? It Takes So Long
"Yes, Nature Cure is all right, but it takes so long." Now and then
we hear this or a similar remark. Our answer is: "No, it does not
take long. It is the swiftest cure in existence."
The trouble is that, as a rule, we have to deal with none but the
most advanced cases of so-called incurable diseases. People go to
the Nature Cure physician only after all other methods of treatment
have been tried and found of no avail.
As long as there remains a particle of faith in the medicine bottle,
the knife or the metaphysical formula of the mind healer, people
prefer these easy methods, which require no effort on their part, to
the Nature Cure treatment, which necessitates personal exertion,
self-control, the changing or giving up of cherished habits. This,
however, is what most of us evade as long as we can. "Exercise, the
cold blitzguss, no red meat, no coffee?--I'd rather die!"
Afraid of Cold Water
The most-dreaded terror on the threshold seems to be cold water.
Undoubtedly, it has kept away thousands from Nature Cure and thereby
from the only possible cure for their chronic ailments. If we could
achieve equally good results without our heroic methods of
treatment, the sidewalks leading to our institution would be crowded
with people clamoring for admission.
After all, this foolish fear is entirely groundless. Cold water is
no more to be dreaded than the bogey man. It is one of our
fundamental principles of treatment never to do anything that is
painful to the patient. We always "temper the wind to the shorn
lamb," the coldness of the water and the force of the manipulations
to the sensitiveness and endurance of the subject. Beginning with
mild, alternately warm and cool sprays, which are pleasant and
agreeable to everyone, we gradually increase the force and lower the
temperature until the patient is so inured to cold water that the
blitzguss becomes a delightful and pleasurable sensation, a positive
luxury.
It is amusing to watch the gradual change in the attitude of our
patients toward the cold-water treatment. In some instances we have
had to spend hours in earnest persuasion before we could induce a
particularly sensitive person to try the first mild spray. A few
weeks later if, perchance, something interfered with the cold water
applications, the patient would indignantly refuse to take the other
treatment if there was to be no cold water.
There is certainly no finer tonic than cold water, no more
exhilarating sensation than that produced by the artistic
application of alternating douches and the blitz.
The real cause of this cold-water scare, we believe, is to be found
in the boasting of the veterans. When, with protruding chest and
chin in air, they brag to the newcomers or to their friends about
their heroism and the coolness with which they allow the cold-water
hose to be turned on them, the listener shudders and exclaims: "This
cold water may be all right for you, but it would never do for me."
No doubt, it is this bravado of the initiated that keeps many a
novice from the first plunge into the mysteries of Nature Cure. If
these timid ones only knew what they miss!
Business Versus Cure
From a business point of view it would, perhaps, be better to omit
the cold water altogether. It would certainly be much less trouble;
but then, the rugged honesty of Father Kneipp, the champion of the
cold-water treatment branch of German Nature Cure, has descended
upon his followers and compels them to tell the whole truth and
nothing but the truth, to make use of everything that is likely to
be of benefit to the patient and to effect a real and lasting cure.
Our friends, the osteopaths, have only a pitying smile for our
arduous labors. They ask: "Why fool with cold water and drive
patients away, when pleasant manipulations bring the business?" If
we query in return: "Do your pleasant manipulations cure obstinate
chronic ailments?" They answer: "We do not expect to cure them. The
effort involves too much labor and spoils the reputation of our
work. Not one in a hundred chronics has the patience and
perseverance to be cured. Besides, if a patient comes too long to
the office for treatment he drives others away."
Some of the most successful osteopaths in this city make it a rule
not to treat a patient longer than six weeks or two months.
In a number of cases this may be sufficient to produce marked
primary improvement, but it is not enough to launch the patient into
a healing crisis and, therefore, does not produce a real cure
because it does not remove the underlying causes of the disease. If,
after a while, the latent chronic condition again manifests in
external symptoms, the patient returns for another course of
treatment; he was "cured" so quickly before and thinks he will be
helped again.
In justice to the osteopaths it must be said that we are not
referring to those chronic diseases which are directly caused by
lesions of the spine or other bony structures. If such dislocations
or subluxations be the sole cause of the trouble, their correction
by manipulative treatment may produce a cure within a few weeks.
But notwithstanding the teachings of orthodox osteopathy, the
majority of chronic ailments have their origin in other causes. In
most cases, the existing spinal lesions are themselves the result of
other primary disease conditions which must be removed before the
bony lesions will remain corrected.
The mode of treatment depends upon the object that is to be
accomplished. If it is to make the patient feel better with the
least possible expenditure of time, money, personal effort and
self-control on his part, and the least amount of exertion on the
part of the physician or healer, then osteopathic manipulations or
meta-physical formulas may be in order. But if the object is to cure
actually and permanently a deep-seated chronic disease, all the
methods of the natural treatment, intelligently combined and adapted
to the individual case, will be required in order to accomplish
results.
Pull the Roots
Cutting off their heads does not kill the weeds. The first sign of
improvement in the treatment of a chronic disease does not mean a
cure.
Diagnosis from the Eye, borne out by everyday practical experience,
reveals the fact that symptomatic manifestations of disease are due
to underlying constitutional causes; that the chronic symptoms are
Nature's feeble and ineffectual efforts to eliminate from the system
scrofulous, psoric or syphilitic taints and the disease products
resulting from food and drug poisoning, or to overcome the
destructive effects of surgical mutilations.
An abatement of symptoms is, therefore, not always the sign of a
real and permanent cure. The latter depends entirely on the
elimination of the hereditary and acquired constitutional taints and
poisons.
When, under the influence of natural living and methods of
treatment, the body of the chronic becomes sufficiently purified and
strengthened, a period of marked improvement may set in. All disease
symptoms gradually abate, the patient gains in strength, both
physically and mentally, and he feels as though there was nothing
the matter with him any more.
But the eyes tell a different story. They show that the underlying
constitutional taints have not been fully eliminated--the weeds have
not been pulled up by the roots.
This can be accomplished only by healing crises, by Nature's
cleansing and healing activities in the form of inflammatory and
feverish processes; anything short of this is merely preliminary
improvement, "training for the fight," but not the cure.
When you order a suit of clothes from your tailor, you do not take
it away from him half-finished; if you do, you will have an
unsatisfactory garment.
No more should you interfere with your cure after the first signs of
improvement. Continue until you have thoroughly eliminated from your
system the hidden constitutional taints and the drug poisons which
have been the cause of your troubles. After that you can paddle your
own canoe; right living and right thinking will then be sufficient
to maintain perfect health and strength, physically, mentally and
morally.
Is the Chronic Patient to Be Left to His Fate
Because Allopathy Says He Is Incurable?
Frequently we have been severely criticised by our friends, our
coworkers or our patients for accepting certain seemingly hopeless
chronic cases. They exclaim:
"You know this man has locomotor ataxy and that woman is an
epileptic: you certainly do not expect to cure them," or, "Doctor,
don't you think it injures the institution to have that
dreadful-looking person around? He is nothing but skin and bones and
surely cannot live much longer."
Sometimes open criticism and covert insinuation intimate that our
reasons for taking in incurables are mercenary.
If we should dismiss today those of our patients who, from the
orthodox and popular point of view, are considered incurable, there
would not remain ten out of a hundred; and yet our total failures
are few and far between. Many such seemingly hopeless cases have
come for treatment month after month, in several instances for a
year or more, apparently without any marked advance; yet today they
are in the best of health.
Yes, it is hard work and frequently thankless work to deal with
these patients. It would be much easier, much more remunerative and
would bring more glory to confine ourselves to the treatment of
acute diseases, for it is there that Nature Cure works its most
impressive miracles. On the other hand, to achieve the seemingly
impossible, to prove what Nature Cure can accomplish in the most
stubborn chronic cases, sustains our courage and is its own
compensation.
The word chronic in the vocabulary of the "Old School" of medicine
is synonymous with "incurable." This is not strange; since the
medical and surgical symptomatic treatment of acute diseases creates
the chronic conditions, it certainly cannot be expected to cure
them. If, by continued suppression, Nature's cleansing and healing
efforts have been perverted into chronic disease conditions, the
following directions are given in the regular works on medical
practice:
"When this disease reaches the chronic stage, you can no longer cure
it. You may advise the patient to change climate or occupation. As
for medication, treat the symptoms as they arise."
We know that the symptoms are Nature's healing efforts; when these
are promptly treated, that is, suppressed, it is not surprising that
the chronic does not recover. In fact, it is the treatment which
makes him and keeps him a chronic.
Why Nature Cure Achieves Results
Nature Cure achieves results in the treatment of chronic diseases
because its theories and practices are entirely opposite to those
just described. However, when the Nature Cure physician claims that
he can cure cancer, tuberculosis, epilepsy, paralysis, Bright's
disease, diabetes or certain mental derangements, the regular
physician shows only derision and contempt. He will not even
condescend to examine any evidence in support of our claims.
Since, then, Nature Cure offers to the so-called incurable the only
hope and the only possible means of regaining health, why not give
him a chance? Many times apparently hopeless cases have responded
most readily to our treatment, while more promising ones offered the
most stubborn resistance. Even with the best possible methods of
diagnosis, it is hard to determine just how far the destruction of
vital organs has progressed, or how deeply they have been
impregnated with drug poisons.
Therefore, it is often an impossibility to predict with certainty
just what the outcome will be. This can be determined only by a fair
trial. In the past we have treated many a case that, according to
the rules and precedents of orthodox science, should be dead and
buried long ago; yet these individuals are today alive and in the
best of health.
Every now and then incidents like the following renew our enthusiasm
and our faith in Nature Cure: Recently, we had three new cases, sent
by three former patients who had been under treatment several years
ago. These three had been among the worst cases ever treated in our
institution. When they came to us, one was supposed to be dying with
cancer, the second was in the advanced stages of tertiary syphilis
and the third, a lady, had survived several operations for the
removal of the appendix and the ovaries. At the time she took up our
treatment she had been advised to undergo another operation for the
removal of the uterus.
These incurables had been exceedingly trying. More than once one or
another had quit, discouraged and disgusted, only to return, knowing
that, after all, Nature Cure was their only hope. After they left
us, we lost track of them and often wondered how they were getting
on. Imagine our pleasant surprise when all three were reported by
the newcomers as being in good health. What if it did take months or
even years to produce the desired results? What would have been the
fate of these three patients if it had not been for slow Nature
Cure?
Discouraged patients frequently ask: "Why do others recover so
quickly when I show so little improvement? This cure seems to be all
right for some diseases, but evidently it does not fit my case."
This is defective reasoning. True Nature Cure fits every case
because it includes everything good in natural healing methods. In
stubborn cases Nature Cure is not to blame for the slow and
unsatisfactory results: the difficulty lies in the character and
advanced stage of the disease.
Chapter XXIII
The Treatment of Chronic Diseases
Let us now consider the best methods for producing the healing
crises referred to in the preceding chapters, that is, the best
methods for treating the chronic forms of disease.
We found that acute diseases represent Nature's efforts to purify
and regenerate the human organism by means of inflammatory feverish
processes, while in the chronic condition the system is not capable
of arousing itself to such acute reactions. The treatment must
differ accordingly.
The Nature Cure treatment of acute diseases tends to relieve inner
congestion, to facilitate the radiation of heat and the elimination
of morbid matter and systemic poisons from the body. In this way it
eases and palliates the feverish processes and keeps them below the
danger point without in any way checking or suppressing them.
While our methods of treating acute diseases have a sedative effect,
our treatment of chronic diseases is calculated to stimulate, that
is, to arouse the sluggish organism to greater activity in order to
produce the acute inflammatory reactions or healing crises.
If the unity of diseases as demonstrated in a previous chapter is a
fact in Nature, it must be possible to treat all chronic as well as
all acute diseases by uniform methods, and the natural remedies must
correspond to the primary causes of disease.
The Natural Methods of Treatment
Natural methods of treatment may be divided into two groups:
Those which the patient can apply himself, provided he has been
properly instructed in their correct selection, combination and
application. Those which must be applied by a competent Nature Cure
physician.
To the first group belong diet (fasting), bathing and other water
applications, correct breathing, general physical exercise,
corrective gymnastics, air and sun baths, mental therapeutics.
To the second group belong special applications of the methods
mentioned under group 1, and in addition to these hydropathy,
massage, manipulation, medical treatment in the form of homeopathic
medicines, nonpoisonous herb extracts and the vitochemical remedies,
and most important of all, the right management of healing crises
which develop under the natural treatment of chronic diseases.
Diagnosis
Correct diagnosis is the first essential to rational treatment.
Every honest physician admits that the "Old School" methods of
diagnosis are, to say the least, unsatisfactory and uncertain,
especially in ascertaining the underlying causes of disease.
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