Nature Cure: Philosophy & Practice Based on the Unity of Disease & CureLindlahr, Henry
Philosophy
Nature Cure: Philosophy & Practice Based on the Unity of Disease & Cure
Lindlahr, Henry
Naturopathy
For instance: The first and temporary effect of cold water applied
to the skin consists in sending the blood to the interior; but in
order to compensate for the local depletion, Nature responds by
sending greater quantities of blood back to the surface, resulting
in increased warmth and better surface circulation.
The first effect of a hot bath is to draw the blood to the surface;
but the secondary effect sends the blood back to the interior,
leaving the surface bloodless and chilled.
Stimulants, as we shall see later on, produce their deceptive
effects by burning up the reserve stores of vital energy in the
organism. This is inevitably followed by weakness and exhaustion in
exact proportion to the previous excitation.
The primary effect of relaxation and sleep is weakness, numbness and
death-like stupor; the secondary effect, however, is an increase of
vitality.
The Law of Dual Effect governs all drug action. The first,
temporary, violent effect of poisonous drugs, when given in
physiological doses, is usually due to Nature's efforts to overcome
and eliminate these substances. The secondary, lasting effect is due
to the retention of the drug poisons in the system and their action
on the organism.
In theory and practice, allopathy considers the first effect only
and ignores the lasting aftereffects of drugs and surgical
operations. It administers remedies whose first effect is contrary
to the disease condition. Therefore, in accordance with the Law of
Action and Reaction, the secondary, lasting effect of such remedies
must be similar to or like the disease condition.
Common, everyday experience should teach us that this is so, for
laxatives and cathartics always tend to produce chronic
constipation.
The secondary effect of stimulants and tonics of any kind is
increased weakness, and their continued use often results in
complete exhaustion and paralysis of mental and physical powers.
Headache powders, pain killers, opiates, sedatives and hypnotics may
paralyze brain and nerves into temporary insensibility; but, if due
to constitutional causes, the pain, nervousness and insomnia will
always return with redoubled force. If taken habitually, these
agents invariably tend to create heart disease and paralysis, and
ultimately develop the patient into a dope fiend.
Cold and catarrh cures (?), such as quinine, coal-tar products,
etc., suppress Nature's efforts to eliminate waste and morbid matter
through the mucous linings of the respiratory tract, and drive the
disease matter back into the lungs, thus breeding pneumonia, chronic
catarrhs, asthma and consumption.
Mercury, iodine and all other alteratives, by suppression of
external elimination, create internal chronic diseases of the most
dreadful types, such as locomotor ataxy, paresis, etc.
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