A man who adopts the homoeopathic methods must be free from prejudice, and able to look fairly at disease conditions from a new angle. He must look at the patient as an individual, not as a disease, and he must treat the patient and not the disease. He must learn that the symptoms that under ordinary training would have been discarded as confusing the issue or as of no value are the very symptoms which, to the homoeopathic physician, simplify the case and provide the strongest clues to the surest method of assistance.
He must possess a sense of values, and be able to train himself to observe and interpret those signs which manifest themselves through the habits and circumstances of the patient, into indications for health-restoring medication which he has at his command.
In other words, he must learn to observe and record cases from the homoeopathic angle. The diagnostic viewpoint which has featured so largely in his training must here take a different place in his perspective. He must take time to trace the source of the disturbance and the remedy to fit the complete picture, always basing the process upon the sound rock of natural laws.
Homoeopathy opens up a vista of opportunities for continually seeking new fields for the demonstration of natural laws, for if, as we believe, these laws are fundamental, their application is universal, and had we the vision to see it we would be convinced not from its application in the field of medicine alone, but in every field of natural science and in applied science as well.
The vista in the field of medicine which is opened up for cure under the homoeopathic method of treatment is a wide one, and cure is always accomplished with the least possible disturbance to the patient and in the gentlest manner, yet with the most profound effect on the whole individual. Homoeopathy is a system of medicine upon which we can depend to set the individual system in order, and the patient on the high road to recovery, if recovery is possible. If we fail, we may know that the failure is ours, in that we have not fully compassed the case or a knowledge of the remedies. In a field so vast, it is onceivable that not all available agencies have yet been developed; and our own ignorance may limit us in the use of those remedies which we already have, but those who study homoeopathy with an unprejudiced mind, and those who have practised it faithfully and purely, can and do attest its unsurpassed results when conscientously applied to the sick.
If a chain is no stronger than its weakest link, we must examine the links individually, one by one, and not determine their strength or weakness by testing the complete chain as our first measure.
