Homeopathic Materia Medica

Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica, James Tyler Kent

Generalities: You will be surprised, when studying full provings of this substance, to notice that all the symptoms seem to centre about the stomach; it does not matter much what kind of complaints he suffers from the stomach takes part in it.

The pains disturb his stomach and bring, on nausea; with his headache he is sick at the stomach; with all complaints his stomach is out of order, and, on the other band, whenever he disorders his stomach he is sick all over. Complaints that manifest themselves through the stomach very frequently need this medicine.

First in importance are the mental symptoms showing the type of constitution likely to need this remedy. It produces a very serious state in the mind, an absence of the desire to live. It is well known to physicians that the case is a serious one if the patient has no desire to live; life is a burden. When I hear a patient say:

"Oh, doctor, if I could only die."

I do not like such a case; there is some deep-seated trouble in the economy that is hard to remove. Something is threatening, and when it comes it is a common thing to see the patient actually die.

"Loathing of life."

You will find this especially in a low, lingering, continued fever, such as typhoid. This remedy has all the prostration of typhoid, and it has the continued type of fever as well as the intermittent and remittent. The prostration is similar to Arsenicum, but Ars. have overwhelming fear of death, while this medicine has loathing of life; and so they both part company. Ars, has overwhelming restlessness, this remedy is seldom restless. Ars. has an intense thirst, this medicine is thirstless.

So even though both these remedies have excessive exhaustion with continued fever, we see they have features dissimilar enough to make them wholly distinct. Such a typhoid will sometimes be seen in young girls about puberty who are threatening to go into chlorosis. They have loathing of life, but it is a hysterical loathing of life.

Moments of great exhaustion, sudden attacks of weakness and fainting. You will commonly find another feature with this, not coming at the same moment. but alternating with it, or only present at times, namely, these over excitable, intense, nervous, hysterical, ecstatic young girls and women are overcome by mellow lights such as flow through stained glass windows or the mellow light from the moon in the evening.

That is, what is meant when it says in the text:

"Sentimental mood in the moonlight."

It is a hysterical state, a disorderly outburst of the affections, such affections as can be aroused only in one who is sick, or one who is unbalanced in the general nervous system.

This kind of patient gives us the mental state and constitution of Ant. crud., and along with such mental states the physical conditions seems to strike to the stomach, as it were.

We have running through this remedy a general state that you should keep in mind, that is, a gouty or rheumatic state, in which the symptoms change with the changes of the weather; worse in cold, damp weather, worse from cold bathing, better from the heat of a hot bath, worse from taking sour wine, and worse from stimulants of any kind.

When you use the expression "worse from wine.," it is not only important to know that the patient is worse from wine, but also the character of complaints that are worse from wine.

This patient becomes easily intoxicated, but the physical symptoms are more disturbed than the mental; his gouty symptoms are worse from sour wine; all the pains and aches of the body are worse from sour wine; headaches come from this cause and the gastric disturbances are greatly aggravated from sour wine.

This patient is worse at night, worse in damp weather, worse from damp cold, better from lying down quietly, better from applied heat, but much worse from over-heating and from radiated heat, and in a warm room.

Many of the symptoms come on in the sun's rays and from the heat of an open grate. The open fire is wholly against the Ant. crud. patient.

A child with whooping cough will cough more after looking into the fire. Such things are queer; they are so strange that there is no philosophical hypothesis to explain them, no theory that looks toward an explanation, but they are facts which we must accept.

Gout: The whole gouty nature of the case seems to change so suddenly that you wonder where the more exterior symptoms have gone to, for all at once in a night or a day the patient commences to vomit and you have persistent vomiting, lasting days and weeks, until the gouty symptoms come back into the extremities.

It is wonderful how quickly this old-fashioned metastasis will come on, this changing from one place to another. The gout suddenly ceases in the extremities and stomach symptoms come on, and you may call it gout in the stomach if you will.

Catarrhal symptoms: There are catarrhal symptoms in this remedy; catarrh of the nose, stomach, rectum, etc., and an increased flow of mucus from any of these localities from drinking sour wine and from taking cold.

A distressing feature of the catarrh is the stuffing up of the nose at night. As soon as he gets into an overheated room, his nose gets stuffed lip.

The coryza has a tendency to become chronic, because of the low and feeble circulation and the poor constitution.

When it becomes chronic it is worse at night and is associated-with headaches. As the catarrh slackens up and becomes dry the headache becomes worse; he has neuralgia in the head, crushing pains and dreadful sickness at the stomach with vomiting.

He often has an attack of sick headache and it will be called by the family a gastric sick headache, but the condition just mentioned comes on from taking cold, which slacks up the thick discharge into a dryness of the nose and the inhaled air burns the nose like fire.

Sometimes these troubles pass off after an intense vomiting spell; sometimes they do not, but the headache may remain for days not relieved by vomiting, or relieved only after prolonged vomiting.

Headache: There are remedies full of headache and as soon as ho vomits he feels better, but in this remedy he vomits long, and becomes relaxed and exhausted.

The headache is worse moving about, worse at night better from lying down, from keeping quiet, better in the open air, worse in warm room, worse from overheating, worse from radiated heat and light. You see now how the catarrh, the headache and gastric symptoms all belong together.

It is because the patient is sick that you cannot take symptoms separately, you must prescribe for the whole man.

There is another feature belonging to the mucous membranes, and an important one; these membranes have a tendency to throw out a milky white exudation or deposit, and it is especially noticed upon the tongue.

Mucous membranes: The whole tongue is covered with a milk-white coating. This you find in all diseases where the remedy is indicated.

In the stomach disorders of children, in gastric fevers, in complaints with fever and much vomiting great irritation of the whole nervous system and in irritation of the stomach in typhoids, the tongue looks white. Upon the slightest provocation he will retch and gag.

Every thing seems to disturb him. He has loathing of food; the thought and smell of food disturb him. This is like Arsenicum.

Voice and larynx: He takes a cold bath at night on going to bed and gets up in the morning voiceless cannot speak a word.

This has come on in an apparently painless manner; he does not know that it is present until he attempts to speak in the morning. This may be present with spasms, of the larynx clutchings of the throat. Colds sometimes go down into the throat and into the trachea, producing a bronchitis or pneumonia.

Cough: Dry, hacking spasmodic cough in diminishing paroxysms.

I will explain that: The first paroxysm occurs with great violence, racking his whole frame, and lasting a longer or shorter period, to be followed by one with less violence and another with less violence; perhaps after a dozen or less paroxysms of diminishing violence, he ends up with a dry, hacking cough which is not a paroxysm.

When this first cough shakes the whole body, whether it is a bronchitis or whooping cough, and the tongue is white, and there are more or less gastric disturbances, Ant. crud. is the remedy.

It will change the whole aspect of the case at once. The chest remains sore, lame and bruised from the violence of the cough.

Stomach: The stomach symptoms must be particularly considered.

Constant nausea, lump in the stomach, feeling all the time as if he had an overloaded stomach, as if he had eaten too much, and that is when he had not eaten at all.

The stomach feels distended although the abdomen is flat. He feels distended and vomits the contents of the stomach; he vomits slime after he has emptied the stomach of its contents; prolonged retching, nausea, sickening load in the stomach and it seems to go on and on.

The vomiting does not relieve and there is increasing exhaustion.

Liver: Inflammation and hardness of the liver or any portion of it.

Pain in the region of the gall bladder. Great pain in the region of the liver, rending, tearing pains in the liver, jaundice is associated with these symptoms at times.

Abdomen: In the abdomen we have a group of symptoms; violent abdominal pains, burning, great distension; there appears to be an increasing distension as if by a screw, gradually forcing down upon something gradually increasing the tension.

We find this state in the tympanitic condition of typhoid fever, we find it in cases of flatulence, we find it in summer diarrheas.

It will be associated with gastric symptoms and the white tongue, especially if such disturbance had been brought on by drinking sour wine, by taking a cold bath, in one who has a gouty constitution, where the nodules in the finger joints become painless and the stomach and bowels become distended and painful.

Diarrhea: This remedy has a nondescript diarrhea, but also a lumpy and liquid diarrhea.

Diarrhea from sour wine. It seems to take a long time to empty the bowels. He hurries to stool and passes a little lump and some liquid, and is soon hurried again to stool and more lumps and liquid are passed, and this goes on in summer diarrheas until finally the bowel is emptied and then there is great tenesmus.

It is a diarrhea ending in dysentery; inflammation of the rectum and colon, with suffering, much tenesmus, prolonged efforts and great exhaustion.

Troublesome hemorrhoids in old gouty constitutions. They are always sore and inflamed from a cold, wet day, from cold bathing and, are always worse if he is foolish enough to drink sour wine or take sour food.

The stomach, bowel, rectum and hemorrhoidal complaints are all worse from disordering the stomach with sour wine, sour fruit or indigestible substances from cold bathing and wet weather.

Female: The pelvic viscera become greatly relaxed, especially in women, so much so that there is a dragging down in the pelvis.

It seems as though the contents of the pelvis would be expelled, or would fall out. There is prolapsus of the uterus and a discharge resembling leucorrhoea .

Disturbances of various kinds at the menstrual period.

Irritable and painful ovaries, such as we find associated with hysterical girls; those who suffer from unrequited affections; dreamers.

Sweat: This medicine produces sweating; copious, exhaustive sweats, night sweats, such as we find in lingering diseases.

Sweats from the slightest exertion. If he becomes slightly overheated he fairly boils with perspiration and then takes cold.

Skin: The skin is ulcerated and has a tendency to grow warts, callosities, bad nails and bad hair.

Hard, horny excrescences grow under the nail and are extremely painful. From the ends of the fingers little horn-like excrescences appear.

The slightest pressure will produce a callosity, or a sore place, and in working men you will find an unusual tendency to thickening of the skin on the soles of the feet.

They are very sore to walk upon, because these callous places are sensitive and have numerous centres of little corns. The tendency to build up and indurate belongs to the remedy.

Warts grow upon the hands. The hair is unhealthy. Pustules form upon the skin with red areola.

Pustular eruptions have an inflamed base that is red, and sensitive.

Now, if you will study the proving and get the particulars of the remedy, and fit them into this framework, you will understand something of Ant. crud.

A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica, John Henry Clarke

Native Sulphide of Antimony. Sb2 S3.

Clinical.─Anus, irritation of. Callosities. Catarrh. Chorea. Constipation. Corns. Diarrhoea. Dyspepsia. Eczema. Feet, sore and horny. Fever. Gum-rash. Nails, degeneration of. Nettle-rash. Piles. Prolapsus recti. Red gum. Remittent fever. Stomach, disordered. Sunstroke. Tendons inflamed. Tongue coated. Voice, low. Warts. Whooping-cough.

Characteristics.─Antim. crud. corresponds in a sense to the race of swine, as Arsenic does to horses and Pulsatilla to sheep. It is preeminently a scrofulous medicine, corresponding to gross constitutions with tendency to rough scaling skin with horny patches. With these horny patches is great tenderness, the patient can hardly bear to walk on them. Analagous to these horny excrescences are warts, and Ant c. has cured many cases of these. A student, 17, had twenty-three on right hand and thirty four on left, mainly on backs and fingers, but a few on interior surface of fingers. In addition redness and inflammation of eyelids. Cured in seven weeks with Ant. c. 200x. In the same category may be mentioned the tendency of the nails to grow in splits. Ant. crud. is specially suited to infants and children (with coated moist white tongues) and also to elderly persons. Tendency to grow fat. When symptoms recur they change their locality or go from one side of the body to the other. Left side predominates, especially lower left and upper right. Among special symptoms are: Itching of scalp and falling out of hair. Tendency to take cold about head. Scrofulous ophthalmia, canthi especially affected (Graph. the whole margin). Otorrhoea. Moist eruption behind ears (Graph.). Slight noises startle. Nose-bleed with vertigo; after headache; after rush of blood to head. Children are peevish, won't bear to be touched or looked at. Adults are sulky or sad. Weeping and impressionable. Sentimental mood by moonlight. Amativeness. Suicidal. Gastric and remittent fevers, and fevers of children, with great thirst and the characteristic white tongue. The fever runs higher at night. The child is cross, but unlike the Cham. patient, who wants to be carried, this will scream and show temper at every little attention. There is a form of diarrhoea which alternates with constipation, often found in old people, to which Ant. crud. corresponds. "Stomach weak, digestion easily disturbed, in old people." It cures many cases of mucous piles: continuous oozing, staining linen. In connection with the intolerance of wine of the remedy, it may be mentioned that in one case it produced a feeling of intoxication like that of alcohol, so that the patient refused to take any more of it. A number of nervous symptoms appear in the provings─restlessness, jerking of muscles, etc. Dr. M. Jousset has recorded a severe case of chorea which resisted all the usual remedies and was cured with Ant. crud. prescribed on the digestive symptoms, particularly the characteristic white tongue. A notable characteristic of Ant. crud. is the thickly coated tongue. Generally it is thick and white; milky-white; or like whitewash evenly laid. The edges may be red and sore. Sore, cracked and crusty nostrils and corners of mouth. Abnormal hunger; not relieved by eating; emptiness at epigastrium and want of animal heat. Disgust for all foods. Nursing children throw up a little sour milk as soon as they take the breast or bottle (Aethus c., after vomiting the child sleeps and wakes hungry; Ant. c. the child refuses to nurse again). The sulphur element in Ant. crud. is strongly pronounced in the provings as in the constipation and other intestinal disorders of the drug. < By heat is a marked characteristic (Apis, Puls., Cham., Secale, Camph.); also < from cold washing (less severe after warm washing), from cold water and cold food. In spite of the < from heat there is great sensitiveness to cold, hence it is suitable to the hydrogenoid constitutions. Moonlight < mental symptoms. Many symptoms are < at night. < By touch. < From wine, especially sour wine; from vinegar and acids (though tamarind water does not disagree); from fruits. < From pork, bread, and pastry. > By rest, by lying down; < rising up; < ascending stairs.

Relations.─Compare: Aethiops ant., Ant. tar., Am. mur., Apis, Bry., Graph., Puls., Ran. b., Rhus t., Sul., Variol.; Cham., Chi, and Stram. (averse to be looked at); Hep., Rhus, Sep., Spi. and Sul. (averse to be washed). Complementary: Scilla. Follows well: Puls., Ipec. Followed by: Puls., Merc., Sul. Antidote to: Stings of insects. Antidoted by: Calc., Hep., Merc. Bry. compares very closely in digestive condition, loaded tongue and < from warmth; in summer complaint.

Causation.─Gluttony. Hot weather. Heat of sun. Getting over-heated. Disappointed love. Suppressed eruptions.

SYMPTOMS.

1. Mind.─Ecstasy and exalted love, with great anxiety about his fate and inclination to shoot himself; worse when walking in the moonlight, and then his conduct is like than of an insane person.─Desponding reflections upon one's condition.─Disgust of life, with an inclination to blow one's brains out, or to drown oneself.─Tendency to be frightened.─Peevish humour, ill-humour.─To be looked at and to be touched are unbearable (in the case of a child).─Dull intellect, imbecility.─Madness.

2. Head.─Confusion of head, as after long labour in the cold.─A feeling of intoxication.─Dizziness with nausea, or bleeding of the nose.─Attack of apoplexy, with frothy salivation.─Cephalalgia, after bathing in running water.─Cephalalgia with dizziness from the smoke of tobacco; better in the open air.─Sensation, as if the forehead were going to burst.─Dull pain in the sinciput and vertex, increased by going upstairs.─Cramp-like pain in the head, ameliorated by walking in the open air.─Piercing pain in the forehead and in the temples.─Sharp pains as from knives in head and under l. breast.─Congestion in the head, painful and followed by epistaxis.─Pain in the bones at the vertex, as if from a swelling in the periosteum.─Teasing itching in the head, with failing off of the hair.

3. Eyes.─Shooting in the eyes.─Red, inflamed eyelids.─Inflammation of the eyes, with itching and nocturnal agglutination of the eyelids.─Slight oozing of the skin near the external angle of the eye.─Humour in the corners of the eyes.─Enlargement of the eyes.─Sensibility of the eyes to the light of day.─Blindness.─Chronic sore eyes of children.

4. Ears.─Shooting in the ears.─Redness, swelling, and heat in the ear.─Otorrhoea.─Digging and murmuring in the ears.─Deafness, as if one had a bandage over the ears; as if a leaf were lying before the ears.─Buzzing in the ears.─Continual roaring in the ears.

5. Nose.─Eruption in the nose.─Excoriation of the nostrils, and of the corners of the nose.─Nostrils chapped and scurfy.─Stoppage of the nose.─Bleeding at the nose, esp. in the evening.─Sensation of coldness in the nose, when inspiring air.─Dryness of the nose, chiefly on walking in the open air.─Accumulation of thick yellowish mucus in the nostrils.

6. Face.─Sad countenance.─Heat in face, and chiefly in the cheeks, with itching.─Red, burning, suppurating eruptions on the face, with yellowish scurf.─Lumps and blisters on the face, as if from the stings of insects.─Granular eruptions, yellow as honey, on the skin of the face.─Eruption, like conoid chicken-pox, on the face and on the nose.─Sensation of excoriation of the chin.─Painful fissures at the commissures of the lips.─Pimples on the upper lip.─Dryness of the lips.

7. Teeth.─Pains in carious teeth, with dull pricking, successive pullings and gnawing, even in the head, renewed after every meal, increased by cold water, and mitigated in the open air.─Jerking toothache in the evening, in bed, and after a meal.─Grinding of the teeth while sleeping in a sitting posture.─Stitches in and about the teeth when inspiring cold air.─Bleeding of the teeth and of the gums, which become detached.

8. Mouth.─Bitter taste in the mouth.─Ptyalism (tasting salty).─Dryness of the mouth.─Accumulation of water on the tongue and in the mouth.─Salivation.─Tongue loaded; with a white coating.─Pain, as of excoriation at the edges of the tongue.─Blisters on the tongue.

9. Throat.─Soreness of the throat, as if there were a plug in it.─Inability to swallow.─Dryness and scraping, or an accumulation of viscid mucus in the throat.

10. Appetite.─Aversion to all food.─Longing for acids.─Thirst chiefly in the night.─Loss of appetite.─Sensation of hunger and of emptiness in the epigastrium, in the morning especially, and which is unappeased by eating.─After a meal, dejection, lassitude, fulness and tension in the abdomen.─Great desire to take food, which is not appropriated to strength.

11. Stomach.─Eructations with taste of food, or very acid.─Regurgitation of a watery fluid.─Hiccough on smoking tobacco.─Loathing of food, nausea, and inclination to vomit, as if caused by indigestion.─Heartburn with good appetite.─Nausea after taking wine.─Nausea and vomiturition, from overloading the stomach, or after drinking (sour) wine.─Vomiting of mucus and of bile, sometimes accompanied by diarrhoea, great anxiety, and convulsions.─Pain, burning, and cramp-like in the pit of the stomach, sometimes with despair and inclination to drown oneself.─Tension and pressure in the pit of the stomach.─Painful sensation, as if the stomach were overloaded with food.─Pain in the region of the stomach on being touched.─Gastric catarrh with characteristic white tongue; even if caused by metastasis of rheumatism or gout.

12. Abdomen.─Inflation of the abdomen, with a sensation of fulness, chiefly after a meal.─Violent cutting pains, sometimes with want of appetite; urine red and stools hard.─Sensation of emptiness in the abdomen, as after violent diarrhoea.─Sensation of swelling and of hardness in the inguinal region, on its being pressed.─Accumulation of flatus in the abdomen, with rumbling and borborygmi.

13. Stool and Anus.─Difficult evacuation of hard stools.─Difficult evacuations; the faeces are too large in size.─Urgent inclination to go to stool.─Stool of the consistence of pap.─Diarrhoea, generally watery, with cutting pains.─After vinegar or acid wine, loose stool.─Alternate diarrhoea and constipation, esp. in aged persons.─Constant secretion of yellowish-white mucus by the anus.─Flow of black blood from the anus.─Haemorrhoidal excrescences, blind and running, with burning and tingling.─Burning itching and fissures in the anus.─Expansive pressure in the rectum (during stool as if an ulcer had been torn open) and the anus.─Burning furunculus in the perineum.

14. Urinary Organs.─Frequent inclination to make water, with scanty emission.─Frequent and abundant emission of urine, with abundant flow of mucus, and burning in the urethra, accompanied by pains in the loins.─On coughing, involuntary emission of urine.─Urine aqueous, or of a gold colour, or reddish brown, and sometimes mixed with small red corpuscles.─Incisive pain in the urethra, on making water.

15. Male Sexual Organs.─Excitement of sexual desire, and great lasciviousness.─Pollutions.

16. Female Sexual Organs.─Metrorrhagia.─Sharp and corrosive discharge from the vagina.─Nymphomania from checked catamenia.─Tenderness over ovaries after menses checked by a bath.─Gastro-intestinal disorders of pregnancy.─Pressure in the uterus as if something would come out of it, esp. during uterine haemorrhage.─Toothache before the menses, with boring in the temples.─Quite solid lumps in a watery leucorrhoea, which sometimes causes a smarting down the thighs.─Nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea during pregnancy.

17. Respiratory Organs.─Great heat in the throat while moving in the open air.─Great weakness, or entire loss of voice, chiefly on becoming warm.─Looking into the fire increases cough.─Sensation of a foreign substance in the larynx, with inability to expectorate.─Violent spasm in the larynx, with sensation of excoriation.─Cough, with burning in the chest.─Morning cough, dry and shaking.─Whooping-cough.─Cough as if arising from abdomen.

18. Chest.─Stifling oppression and paralytic orthopnoea.─Respiration deep, with sighing.─Shootings in the chest, when drawing breath and at other times.─Pain, as of contusion, in the pectoralis major, on raising the arm, and on pressure.─Sharp pain under l. breast.

20. Neck and Back.─Cramp-like drawing in the muscles of the neck and of the nape of the neck.─Rheumatic pains in the nape of the neck.─Miliary eruption on the nape of the neck, in the shoulder-blades, and behind the ears.

22. Upper Limbs.─Rheumatic pains in the arms.─Red vesicles on the arms, with itching.─Painful inflammation of the tendons of the elbow, with great redness and curvature of the arm.─Hot and red swelling of the forearm, with shooting tension.─Sensation of drawing in the forearm, the fingers, and the joints of the fingers.─Arthritic pains in the joints of the fingers.─Painful sensibility of the skin under the nails, and slow growth of the nails themselves.─A horny growth under the nail.─Crushed finger-nails grow in splits, with horny spots.

23. Lower Limbs.─Sensation of drawing in the lower limbs, esp. in the coxo-femoral joint.─Lumps, with red rings, on the buttocks and legs.─Violent pain in the lower extremities.─Numbness of the legs after sitting for some time.─Shooting pain in the knee and in the tibia.─Drawing pain in knees, lower part l. tibia, in l. heel, and tearing through the r. great toe.─Tumour or white swelling of the knee.─Painful stiffness in the knee, preventing the extension of the leg.─Vesicles on the knee after scratching it.─Sensibility of the soles of the feet, when walking on the pavement.─Red swelling of the heel, with burning shootings, which are aggravated by walking.─Corns on the soles of the feet, and callous excrescence at the tips of the toes.─Pressive pain in the corns.─Burning in the fleshy part of the great toe.─Callous excrescence under the nail of the great toe.

24. Generalities.─Rheumatic pains and inflammation of the tendons, with redness and contraction of the part affected.─Inflammation of the muscles.─Drawings or shootings and tension, principally in the limbs.─Restlessness, uneasiness.─Disposition to start even at slight noises.─Twitching of muscles of many parts of the body.─Convulsions with vomiting.─The symptoms are aggravated in the heat of the sun, after having drunk wine, after a meal, night and morning; amelioration during repose and in the fresh air.─Great sensibility to cold.─Heaviness of all the limbs.─General weakness, esp. at night, on waking.─Emaciation, or great obesity.─Dropsical swelling of the whole body.─Mucous membranes generally affected.─Anasarca.─Marasmus.─Children cannot bear to be touched or looked at.─Chronic affections traceable to suppressed eruptions or ulcers.

25. Skin.─Itching, esp. in the neck, chest, back and limbs.─Eruptions which appear chiefly in the evening, or which itch in the heat of the bed, and prevent sleep.─Miliary eruptions and nettle-rash.─Tumours and blisters, as if from the stings of insects.─Measles-like eruption.─Eruptions, similar to chicken-pox, with shooting pain on pressure.─Thick, hard scabs, often honey-yellow, here and there a crack oozing a green sanious fluid, burning as if immersed in hot embers.─Urticaria white, with red areolae, which itch fearfully.─Pustules with yellowish or brown scurf.─Freckles.─Hepatic spots.─Deep spongy ulcers with gastric ulcers.─Fistulous ulcers.─Horn-like excrescences and disposition to abnormal organisations of the skin.─Corns and callous excrescences on the feet.─Nails discoloured and deformed.─Red and hot swellings.─Degeneration of the skin.─Fungus of the joints.

26. Sleep.─Strong inclination to sleep during the day, and somnolency, chiefly in the evening or morning.─Coma with delirium.─Waking with fright during the night.─Dreams, anxious, horrible, voluptuous, or painful, and full of quarrelling.

27. Fever.─Chilliness predominating even in the warm room.─Sensation of coldness in the nose when inhaling air.─Heat, esp. during the night, before midnight, with cold feet.─Great heat from little exercise, esp. in the sun.─Intermittent fever, with gastric or bilious affections, principally with disgust, nausea, vomiting, eructations, loaded tongue, bitterness of the mouth, with moderate thirst, diarrhoea, tension and pressure at the pit of the stomach, with cutting pains.─Tertian fever.─Hot sweat, early in the morning every second day.─Pulse irregular, sometimes quick, sometimes slow.

Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of Some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica (Allen's Keynotes), Henry Clay Allen

Sulphide of Antimony (SbS3)

For children and young people inclined to grow fat (Cal.); for the extremes of life. Old people with morning diarrhoea, suddenly become constipated, or alternate diarrhoea and constipation; pulse hard and rapid. Sensitive to the cold. < after taking cold. Child is fretful, peevish, cannot bear to be touched or looked at; sulky, does not wish to speak or be spoken to (Ant. t., Iod., Sil.); angry at every little attention. Great sadness, with weeping. Loathing life. Anxious lachrymose mood, the slightest thing affects her (Puls.); abject despair, suicide by drowning. Irresistible desire to talk in rhymes or repeat verses. Sentimental mood in the moonlight, especially ecstatic love; bad effects of disappointed affection (Cal. p.). Nostrils and labial commissures sore, cracked and crusty. Headache: after river bathing; from taking cold; alcoholic drinks; deranged digestion, acids, fat, fruit; suppressed eruption. Gastric complaints from over-eating; stomach weak, digestion easily disturbed; a thick milky-white coating on the tongue, which is the red strand of the remedy; very subject to canker sores in the mouth (Arg. n., Sulph.). Longing for acids and pickles. Gastric and intestinal affections: from bread and pastry; acids, especially vinegar; sour or bad wine; after cold bathing; over-heating; hot weather. Constant discharge of flatus, up and down, for years; belching, tasting of ingesta. Mucus: in large quantities from posterior nares by hawking; from anus, ichorous, oozing, staining yellow; mucous piles. Disposition to abnormal growths of the skin; fingernail do not grow rapidly; crushed nails grow is splits like warts and with horny spots. Large horny corns on soles of feet (Ran. b.); very sensitive when walking, especially on stone pavements. Loss of voice from becoming over-heated. Cannot bear the heat of the sun; worse from over-exertion in the sun. (Lach., Nat. m.); < from over-heating near the fire; exhausted in warm weather; ailments from sunburn. Whooping cough: < by being over-heated in the sun or in a warm room; from cold washing. When symptoms reappear they change locality or go from one side of the body to the other. Aversion to cold bathing; child cries when washed or bathed with cold water; cold bathing causes violent headache; causes suppressed menses; colds from swimming or falling into the water (Rhus).

Relations. - Complementary: Squilla. Similar: to, Bry;, Ipec., Lyc., Puls., in gastric complaints. Follows well: after, Ant. c., Puls., Mer., Sulph.

Aggravation. - After eating; cold baths, acids or sour wine; after heat of sun or fire; extremes of cold or heat.

Amelioration. - In the open air; during rest; after a warm bath.

Leaders In Homoeopathic Therapeutics, Eugene Beauharnais Nash

Thick, milky white coating on tongue (in many complaints).

Derangements from overloading the stomach, especially fat food; nausea.

Crushed finger-nails: grow in splits like warts and with horny spots.

Corns and callosities on soles, with excessive tenderness; can only walk with pain and suffering.

Alternate constipation and diarrhoea in old people, especially with the characteristic tongue.

Child cannot bear to be touched or looked at, fretful, cross.

Feverish conditions at night.

Headache; after river bathing; from taking cold; alcoholic drinks; deranged digestion; acids, fat, fruit; suppressed eruptions. Mucus; from anus, ichorous, oozing, staining yellow; mucous piles. Cannot bear heat of sun; < from exertion in sun; exhausted in warm weather.

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This remedy, like the three of which we have been writing, has a strong affinity for the alimentary canal. Its leading characteristic is in its thickly-coated, white, very white, white as milk, tongue.

Many remedies have white tongue, but this one leads them all. It is also a great stomach remedy, and in disorders of this organ arising from over-eating, where there is much nausea, distress, and especially the characteristic tongue, it is to be thought of before any of the three of which we have written. It is especially to be considered if the gastric derangement is of recent date. The process of digestion is hardly under way; the eructations taste of the food as he ate it, and the sufferer feels as if he must "throw up" before there will be any relief. In such a case a few pellets of Antimonium crudum on the tongue will often settle the business, save the loss of a meal, and all further suffering.

Diarrhoea may often follow these dietetic errors, especially during the heat of the summer season, and then the stools are peculiar in that they are partly solid and partly fluid, showing that digestion has been only partially performed in the whole length of the canal Antimonium crudum and Bryonia sometimes present about equal claims in a case of summer complaint; but the case in its entirety must decide the choice between them.

There is a form of diarrhoea which alternates with constipation, oftenest found with old people, where Antimonium crudum is the only remedy. Then it is also one of the best remedies for mucous piles; there is a continuous oozing of mucus staining the linen, very disagreeable to the patient.

There are some mind symptoms that are very peculiar, "the greatest sadness and woeful mood with intermittent fever"; again, "sentimental mood in moonlight, ecstatic love", and again, "child cannot bear to he touched or looked at".

Of the first two symptoms I can say nothing from experience or observation, but of the last, that it is a gem. Many times in cases of gastric or remittent fever, for which Antimonium crudum is a very excellent remedy, I have been led to its use by this very condition of the mind: the child is cross, but not like Chamomilla wants to be carried and soothed, but will scream and cry, and show temper at every little attention. Another thing that I have noticed in many of these cases is, that the fever runs higher at night and is accompanied with great thirst; the white tongue is almost always present. Such children are quite apt, even when around the house, to have "sore, cracked and crusty nostrils, and corners of the mouth", and so this may appear when sick.

There is a peculiar constitutional condition found in some people which calls for this remedy. It is found in the extremities ; finger-nails grow in splits, like warts, with horny spots (Silicea nails crippled, on fingers and toes; Graphites nails become thick, crippled; Thuja nails brittle, crumbling, distorted), and if by accident one becomes injured or split, it does not repair as it should, but grows out of shape. Then the toe-nails are brittle and grow out of shape also, or shrivel up and do not grow at all. The feet are covered on the soles with corns and callosities which are VERY TENDER, can hardly walk on them on account of this tenderness.

Some of the worst cases of chronic rheumatism have been cured by this remedy, guided by the excessive tenderness of the soles of the feet. (Baryta soles get sore from foot sweat; Pulsatilla soles pain and are tender; Ledum heels and soles tender when walking; Medorrhinum couldn't walk except on knees; Lycopod. soles swollen and painful). Horny excrescences anywhere on the skin make one think of Antimonium crudum. The remedy is oftenest found indicated in the extremes of life, in children and old people.

Now the peculiar modalities which deserve particular mention are: First, the troubles are often caused or aggravated by heat, and especially by the heat of the sun. (Bryonia, Glonoine, Gelsem., Nat. carb). The patient feels exhausted during warm weather; the gastric troubles come on, or are worse; such as nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea. The cough is worse, and, like Bryonia, is worse on coming into a warm room from cold air. These affections are particularly worse in sunshine, but also from radiate heat of the fire, so that Antimonium crudum takes a high rank as a not weather remedy. Second, cold bathing aggravates or causes trouble. (Rhus tox., Sulphur) "Child cries when washed or bathed in cold water." Cold bathing causes headache, cold in the head, gastric catarrh, diarrhoea, suppressed menses, toothache, etc. When any case of long standing comes to us, and the patient dates the beginning of the trouble to going in swimming or falling into the water, we think of Antimonium crudum and examine for further indications for the drug.

Now a few scattering symptoms that have found their remedy in Antimonium crudum: "Copious haemorrhage from the bowels, mixed with solid faeces; chronic redness of the eyelids; toothache in decayed teeth, worse at night; gastric trouble after acids, sour wine, vinegar", etc.