guides the Homeopathist, as unerringly as the magnetic needle the storm tossed mariner; and sustains the same relation to legitimate and scientific medicine, as the law of chemical affinity does to science of chemistry, or the law of attraction to the science of astronomy.

So far as a Physician prescribes in accordance with this law, so far he is a Homœopathist, and no farther, whether he gives large doses or small ones, sweet pills or bitter ones. One thing how. ever is certain, whoever prescribes in accordance with the above law of cure, will soon see the necessity of using much smaller doses of medicine, than he who has no other guide than the conflicting dogmas of the past, or the hap-hazard prescriptions of the present Allopathic practice.

It will be admitted by all sensible and reasoning persons, that of all medicinal agents, no two can affect the system in the same, or identical manner, for the reason that no two are composed of the same, or identical constituent elements; unlike causes cannot produce like effects, all things being equal. Another equally indisputable law must be recognized, (viz:) that medicines are elective in their action, i. e., each medicinal agent acts upon particular parts of the system thus Ipecac acts upon the stomach, producing nausea and vomiting; jalap, rhubarb, &c., acts upon the lining membranes of the bowels, producing catharsis; opium and other remedies of that class upon the brain and nervous system; and the set of symptoms produced by each particular article, will each be different. Now these, and all other remedies, act in accordance with elective law, always and invariably; whether taken into the stomach, inhaled into the lungs, in the form of vapour, and odoriferous particles applied to the surface, or injected into the veins. Thus calomel applied externally produces salivation, as certainly as if taken into the stomach; tart. emetic injected into the veins, induces vomiting, as surely and in smaller quantities, than if taken internally. Tobacco smoke inhaled produces all the poisonous effects of that weed, as many can from experience testify, and so with all other remedies. Now, we may take any two remedies that act upon the same part of the organism, and give them to an individual in a state of health, or disease, and we shall find the symptoms differin

just as widely as the remedies themselves differ in component qualities; thus opium and alcohol act upon the brain; yet who cannot readily detect the difference in the symptoms developed by those agents? The red and bloated face of the brandy toper, and the pale, haggard and deathly appearance of the habitual opium eater. Who that has taken cathartics (and who has not,) but can cer tify to the difference in action between rhubarb and jalap. If then all medicines are elective in their action, and each produces symptoms peculiar to itself, what is the nature of the impression made, by which symptoms are educed? we answer that all agents capable of affecting the organism at all, must be stimulants or incitants, (i. e.) they must act by virtue of a positive principle; and the first impression is but an increase of action, or stimulation, sedative effects may arise, but only in consequence of debility, from excessive or long continued stimulation; hence each drug produces a distinct set of symptoms, or drug disease, varying in intensity from a slight impression, that readily passes off on discontinuing the cause, to a violent and persistent drug disease that rapidly destroys the part, and ends in death; or obliges the patient to linger out a miserable existence, worse than death. The impression, or drug disease being governed by the quantity administered, the time of its continuance and the condition of the part, as to health, upon which the medicines acts. Hence we say each medicinal agent produces, when taken into the system, specific effects, (in other words,) a drug disease, "sui generis;" thus rhubarb produces diarrhea; ipecac vomiting, calomel salivation, &c. Now this impression or drug disease is modified by various causes, such as age, sex, habits of life, etc., but chiefly by the condition of the part upon which the medicine acts. We may give a man in health three or four grains of opium, without producing fatal effects, and so we may if he has inflammation of the bowels, or lungs, but if he have inflammation or congestion of the brain, every intelligent Physician would tell you at once, (whether he was Homeopath, Allopath, or any other path,) that you would kill your patient, and for the best of reasons, opium will produce a similar set of symptoms, or disease. So we may take two or three grains, and even more of tartar emetic; vomit perhaps pretty severely and recover without difficulty;

but should we take the same amount, or even less, when the stomach is acutely inflamed, the effects would be speedily fatal; because you would produce a disease similar to the one you wish to cure, The above fatal effects arise not from the simple fact that you have given these remedies, but because you have given them in too large doses, by which you have produced far too violent an impression, or drug disease, and your patient has died, not from a natural, but from an artificial disease, (i. e.) secundum artem, (according to art,) by far too frequently the case. It is a well established fact, that two distinct diseases cannot exist in the same organ, or tissue, at one and the same time, (see John Hunter, M. D.,) but one either cures, or suspends the other, (no person ever had measles and small pox the same time, or measles and scarlet fever; these being diseases of the skin but different in their origin and nature.)

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Now, what Homoeopathy proposes to do, and does, is, to give a medicine that acts upon the part diseased, thereby producing a med. icinal disease that shall overcome and cure the natural one. But in doing this should we give the larger doses of Allopathy, we should invariably kill the patient, the susceptibility of the part to the action of our remedy being so increased by the close similar. ity existing between the disease or the impressions made by the morbific agent, and that which our remedy would produce. Hence the small dose of Homeopathy, and the highly salutary effects.--- ́e give our remedies in quantities just sufficient to produce an impression strong enough to overcome the diseased action. But if our remedy happens to be given in too large a dose, we are sure to make our patient worse.

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Thus in cases of inflammation of the skin produced by heat, (scalds and burns,) we cure by applying hartshorn, (aqua ammonia,) or hot spirits turpentine, as recommended by every Allopathic writer, and every one that has tried it fairly is decided in its favor, (see Druit's Surgery). In inflammation of the eyes, where is the Allopathist but uses as an application weak solutions of sulphate of zinc, (white vitriol,) or nitrate of silver, (lunar caustic,) or some other remedy, that if put into the healthy eye strong enough, would produce inflam. mation. Here experience, (not principle,) has taught them the true law of cure; and all the cures they effect they owe to "similia