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HAHNEMANN'S ORGANON.

[A memorial to the American Institute of Homoeopathy and all Homoeopathic Societies, Physicians and Journals.]

There has recently been issued in Germany from the private press of Mr. Arthur Lutze of Coethen and under his editorship, what purports to be a sixth edition of the Organon of Hahnemann, with additions from the pen of Hahnemann and with annotations from the Editor, Mr. Lutze.

This alleged “Sixth Edition of Hahnemann's Organon” thus edited and printed by Mr. Arthur Lutze, appears to contain unwarranted alterations from the original text, as Hahnemann left it, together with suppression of important parts of the text. And these changes are of so important a character, that the editors of all the homoeopathic periodicals of Germany, differing widely as they do on many points of doctrine and practice, have united in a solemn and earnest protest against the reception of this edition of the Organon as authentic. In this protest they earnestly beseech all Homoeopathic physicians throughout the world and especially all societies, institutes and organized bodies of homoeopathic physicians, after due investigation of the subject, to unite with them.

The object of this memorial is to lay before the profession this unanimous protest of the German homoeopathic press and, in connection therewith, to present likewise such additional history and testimony bearing on the subject as may be necessary to a full comprehension of it.

The protest of the German press appears in the following words in the Allgemeine Homoeopathische Zeitung, Vol. 70, 15, April 10th, 1865.

Protest. - In view of the fact that Mr. Sanitacts-Rath, A. Lutze of Coethen, has undertaken to publish a sixth edition of S. Hahnemann's Organon of the Healing Art, the undersigned, in the interest of their science and as the present representatives of the German homoeopathic press, feel it their duty to make the following explanation.

Homoeopathy has always excited the interest of the laity in a far greater degree than any other system of medicine, and to this very interest it largely Indebted for its extension and recognition. Even now, many places, in which the number of its representatives is far from corresponding to the needs of the public who confide in it, are dependent upon practitioners who are not regularly educated physicians, (Nichtaerzte) and whose true devotion to Homoeopathy must in part compensate for their lack of a scientific study of it. It would be ungrateful to wish to conceal this fact and not to lay aside all spirit of caste and recompense, with the most public recognition, the services of very many of these persons in the matter of the propagation of Homoeopathy.

But it is no less true, that there are limits within which an active and independent participation by laymen and dilettanti becomes an impossibility, unless it should reduce science to a piece of mechanism and make the healing art a handicraft. It is the duty of every honorable representative of Homoeopathy to keep a zealous watch, to the end that no unqualified hand grasp and jostle its inner sanctuary, whether it be the hand or an opponent or of an adherent.

The Organon, this work of Hahnemann's which comprises the collected principles of Homoeopathy and establishes them on scientific bases, has already, with great propriety, been called the Bible of Homoeopathy. A new edition of this work which, it is well known, has long been out of the book trade, must be a welcome circumstance to every Homoeopathician. But assuredly, everyone will also be constrained to ask, how comes Mr. Lutze to undertake this honorable duty? And still more, how comes Mr. Lutze to introduce this new edition of Hahnemann's work, with his own name upon the title-page, since assuredly he can have exercised no function but simply and purely that of a publisher and bookseller? But this reasonable question is completely silenced in the face of an incomparably more important and weighty fact, which nothing short of a complete misapprehension of his own position and the greatest self-conceit on the part of Mr. Lutze could have rendered possible.

Lutze has permitted himself not only to add to Hahnemann's work a new and emphatic dedication and several additions in the way of annotations and an appendix, but his even removed several paragraphs of Hahnemann's (272-274 or the fifth edition) and his substituted for them a new paragraph which expresses directly the opposite of what was heretofore laid therein, and he has, by so doing, deliberately and without any right, annihilated one of the cardinal principles of Homoeopathy.

The annulled paragraphs contain the precept, that in homoeopathic practice, only one single simple remedy should be given at one time to the patient; they contain the reason for this precept and moreover an impressive warning against the danger of ever combining remedies. Instead of all this, the paragraph which has been smuggled in sanctions the administration of the so-called double and triple remedies for certain alleged cases. Everyone who is only tolerably familiar with Homoeopathy must know that the exclusive administration of simple and uncombined remedies is one of the three principal pillars on which the entire edifice of Homoeopathy rests. To take this away means nothing less than to entirely overturn Homoeopathy.

And how does Mr. Lutze justify this outrage or at least cloak it with the semblance of a title? In this way. He perpetrates a falsification of history and he confounds with one another circumstances that occurred in former years, in that he appeals to a letter of Hahnemann's written in 1833, from which it appears that Hahnemann, at the instance of Dr. Aegidi, had for some time been ready to introduce into the fifth edition of the Organon a paragraph in favor of “double remedies.”

But, in order to a right understanding of this circumstance and in justice to the history of Homoeopathy and to the name of Hahnemann, it should not be concealed that upon the unanimous representations of his followers, Hahnemann immediately reconsidered this momentary weakness towards a dear friend, and that he not only did not introduce the unwholesome paragraph into the said fifth edition, but even considered it his duty to repeat, more impressively than ever, the before mentioned warning against combining remedies. And in this conviction he remained true and firm; for up to the day of his death, ten full years, he did and published nothing which could be alleged as bearing against this claim. But can anyone, who has any knowledge whatever of Hahnemann's character, suppose for an instant, that he could be turned back by any but the most conclusive reasons, or that, for the space of ten years, he would have failed, through hesitancy or indecision, to recall this fifth edition, if he had been really convinced of the correctness of other views than those therein stated? No! Hahnemann, that Iron-Head, was not the man of cowardly compliance or of passive sufferance who would have let that befall, in regard to his own Homoeopathy, which he did not hold to be the right! And now, twenty-two years after his death, there comes an officious meddling fellow, who would make us believe, as though he had only soft heads and neophytes to deal with, that Hahnemann had “like Saturn devoured his own children.”

Have we then said too much, when we speak of falsification of history and of a perversion of the facts? Truly, even were Lutze quite another than in fact he is, we should be compelled to fling in his face the charge of the boldest assumptions, the most unheard-of self exaltation and of falsification, and without mercy tear him down from the dictatorial chair which he has usurped. He, least of all, is the man who should offer to do such things. Out of such timber may indeed he hewn lubbers for the masses who are incapable of reflecting and of calling to account, but never the reformers of Medicine!

In view of these facts, we the representatives of the scientific Homoeopathic Press of German, hereby solemnly protest against this alleged sixth edition of Hahnemann's Organon, and we declare the same to be spurious and apocryphal and at the same time we repudiate all fellowship with such conduct, and with its perpetrators, and we denounce it and them. Confident of the entire support of all the true representatives of Homoeopathy, we anticipate, first of all from all parts of Germany, and from foreign lands, from individuals and from societies, a formal concurrence in this protest, and we anticipate with more especial confidence from the Central Union of the Homoeopathic Physicians of Germany, that, at its next meeting, it will adopt more positive regulation against such compromisings of Homoeopathy and will go to work energetically against all spoilers of our science.

(Signed), Dr. Bolle, Ed. Hom. Pop. Zeitung,

Dr. Hirschel, Ed. Zeit, fur Hom. Klinik,

Dr. Meyer, Ed. Ally. Hom. Zeit.,

Dr. C. Muller, Ed. Hom. Vierteljahrschrift.

In order that the allusion in the above protest to Hahnemann's “dear friend,” Dr. Aegidi, as well as the documents which are to follow, may be more clearly understood, a few words of a historical nature may here be introduced.

Mr. Lutze published in 1860 a popular “Manual of Homoeopathic Theory and Practice for Domestic Use.” A translation of it by Dr. C. J. Hempel was published in New York, in 1863. In this Manual Mr. Lutze authorizes the use of two or even three drugs, in combination, in one and the same dose. He claims to have for this practice the sanction and encouragement of Hahnemann, Aegidi and von Boenninghausen. His language is as follows:

This important discovery of the combination of drugs was first announced twenty-four years ago by Dr. Julius Aegidi, at that time Physician to the Princess Frederica of Prussia, and now Medical Councillor. This discovery was communicated to Hahnemann in the year 1833, corroborated by 233 cures with combined remedies, and was joyfully received by Hahnemann, but kept secret from the public by the imbecility of the foes of truth, whereas the worthy discoverer was insulted and derided by those who were unworthy or unloosing his shoe-strings.

Mr. Lutze then gives u letter from Hahnemann to Aegidi, dated May 15th, 1833:

Dear Friend and Colleague: Do not suppose that I reject anything good from mere prejudice or because it might lead to modification in my doctrine. All I desire is truth, and I know that this is all you care for. I am rejoiced that you should have had such a happy thought at the same time confining its execution to proper limits. Two remedies should only be given in combination, in a highly potentized form, provided each is, in its own way, homoeopathic to the case. In such a case, this proceeding is an advantage to our art which should not be repudiated. I shall take the first opportunity of making a trial, and I doubt not it will be successful. I am likewise glad to hear that Boenninghausen approves of this plan.

Lutze proceeds :

In another letter to Dr. Aegidi, Hahnemann writes, under date of June 19tb, 1833: I have devoted a special paragraph to your discovery of a combination of drugs, in the fifth edition of my Organon, the manuscript copy of which was last night sent to Arnold; etc.

Lutze goes on to say:

What has become or this paragraph? We search the Organon from beginning to end without finding it. Here is the explanation. Hahnemann laid the new discovery, which he had kept secret heretofore, before the meeting or homoeopathic physicians of the 10th of August 1888. Their number was as yet small, but instead or meeting with open hearts he found stubborn minds, who, instead of accepting the blissful truth, assailed it with all sorts of persecutions, comparing it to the mixtures of allopathic practitioners and persuading Hahnemann to abandon the publication or this discovery and to allow one of his friends to suppress the paragraph which had been printed.

He proceeds to say that Aegidi was shamefully abused and that he preferred to remain silent, rather than expose himself to abuse and assaults. He adds:

I do not know the persons who have perpetrated this robbery; most of them may be in their graves. The time for requital has come; the hitherto suppressed discovery rises like a phoenix from its ashes and the name of its. author, Julius Aegidi shall be snatched from oblivion. *** Three or four years ago the discoverer first acquainted me with the combination of remedies. *** Our excellent Boenninghausen has informed me orally that he has obtained equally fortunate results, etc.

It will be seen that Mr. Lutze defends his use of combined drugs by the testimony of Drs. Aegidi and von Boenninghausen - strong names certainly. But it so happens that Dr. Aegidi, who is still living, had already placed himself on record in terms which directly conflict with the above statements of Mr. Lutze, while a letter quoted below from Dr. von Boenninghausen to your memorialist is equally conclusive, touching the decided disapproval with which the practice of combining drugs was regarded by Dr. von Boenninghausen, who moreover intimates, by the way, that he does not know and has never met Mr. Arthur Lutze.

May 12th. 1857, Dr. Aegidi published in the Allgemeine Zeitung an explanatory note, disavowing and disapproving the practice of combining drugs. Yet, in the face of this disavowal, Mr. Arthur Lutze, in 1860, hails Aegidi as the discoverer of the method and thereby claims “to snatch his name from oblivion.”

Now again, April 12th, 1863, on seeing the Protest of the German Homoeopathic Press against Lutze's edition of the Organon, Dr. Aegidi publishes a second card in the following language (from the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, 70, 17, 186, April 24th, 1865):

Explanation. - The protest of the honored representatives of the homoeopathic press of Germany against the alleged sixth edition of the Organon of the Healing Art, published in the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, of April 10th, Hahnemann's birthday, having embraced the mention of my name, yet having omitted to mention that I also participate in the conviction in behalf of which the signers of the protest contend - that, years ago I, loudly and publicly, made known my disapproval of the administration of so-called double remedies, as an abuse and a mischievous proceeding - I find myself compelled to publish my explanation as it originally appeared in the Allg. Homoeopathische Zeitung, 54, 12, May 18th, 1857, and thence was copied in the New Zeitschrift fur Homoeopathische Klinik, II, 12, June 15th, 1857. It was in the following language:

“The undersigned finds himself compelled to join his voice in the reproaches that have been made, particularly of late, against the homoeopathic administration of so-called double remedies; so much the more, inasmuch as it is he who is charged with having taken the initiative in this mode of acting which is the subject of reprobation. Entirely agreeing with all the arguments adduced against it by competent persons and the refutation of which must be impossible, the undersigned is compelled to make known publicly and emphatically his decided disapproval of such an abuse of our excellent and most serviceable art, as has been lately recommended in an apparently systematic manner and as a rule; to the end, that persons may forbear to take his supposed authority, as a sanction of a mode of treatment which, even as he (Stapf's Archives, 1834 14.) thought he might recommend a modification of it for very rare and exceptional cases, is very far from being the abuse and mischief which it is now made and being made.”

I add to this that I thoroughly agree with the contents of the above-mentioned protest; and that, in my opinion, the practice therein rebuked is not dealt with even as severely as in the interests of our science, it should have been.

Freienwald, a. d. O. April 12th, 1865. Aegidi.

When the American translation of Lutze's Manual appeared in 1863, your me moralist wrote, under date March 2d, to Dr. von Boenninghausen quoting the passages which refer to him and asking to be informed on the subject. The following reply was promptly received:

Muenster, March 25th 1863.

To Dr. Carroll Dunham, New York,

My Very Dear Friend and Colleague: I have just, today, received your letter of the 2nd inst. The passage which you quote concerning the “combined doses, containing two different remedies” imposes on me the duty of replying without a moment's delay. It is true that during the years 1832 and 1833, at the instance of Dr. Aegidi, I made some experiments with combined doses, that the results were sometimes surprising and that I spoke of the circumstance to Hahnemann, who after some experiments made by himself, had entertained for a while the idea of alluding to the matter in the fifth edition of the Organon, which he was preparing in 1833. But this novelty appeared too dangerous for the new method of cure, and it was I who induced Hahnemann to express his disapproval of it in the fifth edition of the Organon (1833), in the note to § 272. Since this period, neither Hahnemann nor myself have made further use of these combined doses. Dr. Aegidi too was not long in abandoning this method which resembles too closely the procedures of Allopathy, opening the way to a relapse from the precious law of simplicity - a method too, which is becoming every day more entirely superfluous, from the augmentation of our Materia Medica.

If, consequently, in our day: a Homoeopathician takes it into his head to act according to experiments made thirty years ago, in the infancy of our science, and subsequently rebuked by unanimous vote, he clearly walks backwards, like a crab, and shows that he has not kept up with nor followed the progress of science.

Supposing that it may interest you to know the origin of the above-mentioned method, I add the following: There was about this time (1832 and 1883) at Cologne; an old physician named Dr. Stoll, himself a constant invalid and hypochondriac, who, distrusting the old medical doctrine but having only a superficial smattering of Homoeopathy, had conceived the idea of dividing the remedies into two classes, the one of which should act upon the body, and the other upon the soul. He thought that these two kinds of medicine should be combined in a prescription, in order to supplement each other.

His method making some noise in Cologne, and Dr. Aegidi, then at Dusseldorf, having in vain endeavored to discover the essential secret of its novelty, the latter induced me to endeavor to find it out. I succeeded in doing so. Although the idea of Dr. Stoll was utterly devoid of foundation, it nevertheless induced us to make experiments in another way, namely, that above recited, but which, as I said before, was utterly rejected long, long ago.

You will see by the Allgemeine Homoepathische Zeitung that Mr. Lutze offers to sell his establishment at Coethen and move to Gotha. * * *

(Signed), Yours very sincerely

C. von Boenninghausen.

It thus appears, even from Hahnemann's own letter to Aegidi, which is the only authority Lutze had, in 1860, for claiming Hahnemann's approval of this practice, that Hahnemann only promised to “take the first opportunity of making a trial,” and although he subsequently spoke of a purpose to allude to the subject in his Organon, he nowhere states that he did make successful trials. But he does state that he “would not reject anything good from mere prejudice.” From the fact, then, that he did reject this method, and that he concluded not even to allude to it in the Organon, we are forced to the conviction that he did not regard it as, “anything good.”

Moreover, Aegidi, its reputed author, and Boenninghausen, who is alleged to have favored it, are most emphatic in its reprobation.

The Homoeopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania, having carefully considered the subject, has issued the following Protest:

A Protest. - At a meeting of the Faculty of the Homoeopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania, the following Preamble and Resolutions were discussed and unanimously adopted:

Whereas, A book, purporting to be the sixth edition of Hahnemann's Organon has been published at Coethen, Germany; and

Whereas, The representatives of Homoeopathic Journalism in Germany have issued their earnest protest against this unwarranted sixth edition of said work and have pronounced and declared it to be mutilated and perverted in that the paragraphs numbered 272-274 in the fifth edition or said work, treating on the simplicity of the remedy to be administered, have been omitted and spurious and false ones have been inserted in their place, recommending double and triple mixtures:

Resolved, That we fully endorse the Protest published in Vol. 70, No. 15 of the Allgemeine Homoeopathic Zeitung.

Resolved, That we protest against the introduction of any translation into English of any spurious and false edition, as a standard work of Homoeopathy.

Resolved, That we call the attention of the American Institute of Homoeopathy, at its next meeting on the 6th proximo, and of all other State and County Homoeopathic Societies to the above Protest; and that we solicit their co-operation in endeavoring to protect our science from perversion by false and spurious interpolations into its standard literature.

Resolved, That we request this, our protest against said book, to be published in all the American, British, German and other homoeopathic journals, and a copy thereof to be transmitted to each of the State and County Homoeopathic Societies in the United States.

In testimony whereof, we have hereunto affixed our signatures, this twentieth day of May, A. D. 1865.

Constantine Hering, M.D., Prof. of Inst. and Pract.; Adolphus Lippe, M.D., Prof of Materia Medica; H. N. Guernsey, M. D.,Prof. of Obstetrics; Charles G Raue, M. D., Prof. of Pathology; George R. Starkey, M. D., Prof. of Surgery; Pusey Wilson, M. D., Prof. of Anatomy; J. H. P. Frost, M. D., Prof. of Physiology.

In view of these facts, your memorialist prays the American Institute of Homoeopathy and all homoeopathic societies, as well as the homoeopathic press, to give the weight of their name and authority in behalf of the purity of our doctrine and literature by joining in the unanimous protests of the German Homoeopathic Press, of distinguished German physicians and of our oldest American Homoeopathic College, against this unauthorized, alleged sixth edition of Hahnemann's Organon, by Mr. Arthur Lutze, of Coethen.

New York, June 1st 1865. Carroll Dunham, M.D.

Appendix. - The following documents from the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, 70, 18, May 1st, 1865, were received too late to be incorporated in the above memorial. D.

The Society of the Homoeopathic Physicians of Austria for Physiological Drug-Provings, having received at its general meeting in Vienna, April 10th, 1865, the protest [of the German Homoeopathic Press] against the sixth edition of Hahnemann's Organon, undertaken by Dr. Lutle, of Coethen, has carefully weighed its purport and has adopted the following resolution :

“That the said society fully agrees in the above-mentioned protest and that it authorizes its two representatives, vix: the President, Dr. Ph. Ant. Watzke, and the Editor, Dr. Martin Eidherr, to sign the same in the name of the society.”

(Signed), The Society of Austrian Homoeopathic Physicians for Drug-Provings.

Dr. Ph. Ant. Watzke, President.

Dr. Martin Eidherr, First Editor.

The undersigned [Hungarian Homoeopathic Physicians] give our unqualified adhesion to the protest against the sixth edition of Hahnemann's Organon issued by Mr. Lutze, of Coethen.

Dr. Argenti Dr. Paul V. Balogh Dr. T. Bakody,

Dr. Hausmannm Dr. T. v. Balogh Dr. A. v. Szontagh,

Dr M. Szent Kiralyi.

Pesth, April 20th, 1865.

Letter from Madame Hahnemann to the Editor of the Allgemeine Homoeopathische Zeitung. Most Honored Doctor: To my extreme surprise I learn from No. 14 of the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, of April 3d, 1865, that Dr. Lutze, of Coethen, and Dr. Suss, of London, announce the publication of a sixth, much improved and enlarged edition of the Organon of Hahnemann.

No one, save myself, has the right to publish the sixth edition of the Organon; I alone possess the manuscript of this important work, written by my husband's own hand; to me, alone and exclusively, were confided the improvements which the author made in the Organon.

Dr. Lutze both never saw Hahnemann, and never stood in any connection with him.

Dr. Suss, of London, saw Hahnemann twice; first as a child, six years old, and subsequently, when a student in Leipsic, at the eve of my husband's death; it is therefore impossible that he could have received from him anything new in relation to Homoeopathy.

Now, when others give out that they know something new, when they would make, as it were, a romance out of our sacred Organon, now is the time to publish the genuine and true Organon and I will give it to the press.

As we may not alter, omit or add anything to the Holy Gospel nor the other Holy Scriptures, so neither may we presume to make any change in the Organon, the codex of human health; it must remain as its author created it, and it must appear only in its pure unadulterated truth and genuineness.

I earnestly entreat you, respected Sir, to allow this letter to appear in the next number of the Allg. Hom. Zeitung, just as it is, without any alteration.

Your adherence to the true principles of our beneficent science, and your sense of justice will assuredly guarantee me this favor for which I already thank you beforehand, in my own name and in the name of the true disciples of Hahnemann.

Receive, most esteemed Doctor, the assurance of my most distinguished consideration. (Signed),

M. Hahnemann, 54 faubourg St. Honore, Paris


DOCUMENT DESCRIPTOR

Source: The American Homoeopathic Review Vol. 04 No. 12, 1865, pages 557-566
Description: Hahnemann's Organon; Controversy regarding the sixth edition of Organon published by A. Lutze
Author: Ahomeo05
Year: 1865
Editing: errors only; interlinks; formatting
Attribution: Legatum Homeopathicum
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