The application of the theories and methods of this “old school” necessitates a thorough knowledge of anatomy, pharmocology, pathology, bacteriology, physiology and other sciences.  At the present time much stress is also laid upon the means for the prevention and the eradication of diseases and their causes.  The inefficiency of drugs is recognized and besides the articles of the Materia Medica the “regular” physician makes use of antitoxins, vaccines, surgery, electricity, baths, etc., in treating diseases.  Everyday examples of their methods may be seen in the use of quinine in Malaria, antitoxins in Diphtheria and vaccines in Smallpox, etc.

Homeopathy.—­This school was founded by Hahnemann, who lived in Germany over a hundred years ago.  Everyone now admits that he was a great scholar.  In translating a materia medica he was very much struck with the article on cinchona, where it seemed to state that taken continuously in large doses it would produce all the indications of ague.  He tested other remedies in the same way and finally announced his law “Similia Similibus Curantur.”

Definition given by a Medical Dictionary of Homeopathy.—­“A system of treatment of disease by the use of agents that, administered in health, would produce symptoms similar to those for the relief of which they are given.”  For instance, ipecac given in large doses, will produce certain kind of vomiting.  If the same kind of vomiting, with the other symptoms agreeing, occurs in disease ipecac would be given for the trouble.

[Leading schools of medicine 661]

But if the vomiting was produced by ipecac, that same medicine would not be given to stop it, but treatment given for an over dose of the drug, ipecac.  According to the principles of Homeopathy a medicine is selected which possesses the power (drug diseases) of extinguishing a natural disease by means of the similitude of its alterative qualities, (similia similibus curantur); such a medicine administered in simple form at long intervals, and in doses so fine as to be just sufficient without causing pain or debility, to obliterate the natural disease through the reaction of vital energy.

A great many medicines are used in this way by all schools, but the “regular” school claims it is not an universal law.  Some homeopathic doctors claim that the antitoxin treatment for diphtheria, etc. is an application of the homeopathic law.  The poison that produces the diphtheria is taken and from this by a thorough and precise process the serum is made and injected into the body of a person who has diphtheria.

Hydrophobia is successfully treated in the same way.  A homeopathic doctor has a right to use any sized doses he wishes, but he claims experience has proven that large doses are not often necessary and that the medicine usually acts better attenuated.

Eclecticism.—­An eclectic physician is a member of a school or system that claims to select “that which is good from all other schools.”