regret to say, his opinion is without any value. Oddly enough, Dr. Sharp seems to put no great faith in it himself; for in the cures he gives by gold, which are merely a few specimens of the commonest in our hand-books, he gives one in which a prominent feature was ophthalmia with ulcers on the cornea. Now, in his physiological part, there is no mention of its action on the eyes at all. Therefore this is not a homœopathic cure at all, but merely a blind empirical hit, or he must admit the validity of the Hahnemannic eye symptoms of gold which are omitted. So this plan sinks down to nothing but a bald selection of some of the actions of gold given in this form for shortness, which precludes any but the vaguest hints as to its action, and renders all differential diagnosis impracticable.

The last supposition we can form of this Materia Medica is that it may be an attempt to give the pathognomonic symptoms of the drug only. This, if possible, would certainly be the greatest boon to the practitioner, and it has, to a certain extent, been done by Hahnemann, in giving adypsia as the cardinal indication for Pulsatilla. What we mean is this. Supposing it could be said of Ipecacuanha that nausea is the cardinal symptom, and unless that is present, however else it might correspond, it would not be the right medicine; and if the same could be said of dilated pupil for Belladonna, these would be most valuable facts; and a volume, going through the Materia Medica in that way, would be invaluable, though by no means superseding the full provings. We have no reason

to believe in the possibility of such a discovery as a general character of medicines. But, however this may be, the above specimen of Materia Medica does not give us any hope that Dr. Sharp is the man to give us that boon.

So much for the re-arrangement of an old medicine; and if this form is defective for that, what must it be for introducing a new one?

"The following substance has never, to my knowledge, been used in medicine before. I have proved it upon myself some years ago, and have prescribed it in a considerable number of cases, and generally with the greatest satisfaction. I have been anxious to introduce it to my professional brethren, but have hitherto kept it back, partly that I might attain a more settled confidence in it myself, and partly

because I intended it to appear in its place in my own 'Materia Medica.' But as that undertaking is not yet completed, for, as may be supposed, it is one of great extent and labour; as life is uncertain; and as this opportunity seems to be a fitting one, I have much pleasure in presenting it in this place, under your auspices, Sir Benjamin, for to you it is indebted for this happy opportunity of revealing its admirable utility. I give it, not only as a specific itself, but as an illustration and proof of the value of experiments upon the healthy, as a method of discovering specifics in any number, and for any complaint; the limits to these discoveries being the very fewphysicians who are willing to try to make them, and the limited zeal, industry, and talent of mankind.

666 TITANIUM-AS A POISON.

"Titanium was discovered by Gregor in 1791, but we are indebted to Wollaston's experiments, in 1822, for a better acquaintance with it. This rare metal is obtained chiefly from the bottom of the large smelting furnaces in iron works. Several years ago, when one of these furnaces at the Low Moor Iron Works, in Yorkshire, which had been burning without intermission for many years, was blown out for the purpose of undergoing repairs, through the kindness of Mr. Wickham, I obtained a considerable lump of titanium.* The metal was in beautiful cubic crystals, of a deep-red copper colour, and very brilliant metallic lustre. I had some of these crystals triturated by the late Mr. Turner, of Manchester, and experimented with this trituration upon himself. † The proportion was one grain to ninety-nine of sugar of milk. I am not aware of any other proving.

"From these experiments I am assured that titanium has a powerful action upon the human body. After taking the preparation I have described, in doses of two grains, once a day for a week, I became greatly disordered, and felt and looked wretchedly ill. On a careful consideration of my indisposition, I am justified in summing up the action of the drug as being upon

"1. The stomach; bringing on nausea, loss of appetite, and feeling of discomfort.

"2. The brain and nerves; giddiness, imperfect vision, the peculiarity being that half an object only could be seen at once, desire to keep the eyelids closed.

* We believe that the most recent analyses have shewn this to be a cyanide of titanium, and not the pure metal as was formerly supposed.—[EDs.]

This is obscure, is "himself" perhaps a misprint for "myself?"-[Eds.]

"3. The blood; a perceptible derangement of the whole system, which could not, without danger, have been carried further.'

́ ́TITANIUM-AS A REMEDY.

"I have found titanium a most valuable remedy for certain cases, for which no good remedy was known before. They are cases of degeneration of the blood. A time will come when, with a more refined chemistry, our knowledge of the constitution of the circulating fluid which is the life of man's body, and the changes it undergoes in disease, will be better understood than they are at present. We can now speak of the morbid conditions of the blood only in a crude and general manner. We know that the blood is altered from its healthy state in typhus, in chlorosis, in jaundice, in cholera, in inflammatory fever, and in some other diseases, and we can describe, in an imperfect manner, some of these changes, but there remains an inexhaustible field of research in this department of physiology and pathology. The morbid condition of the blood, which may be called the titanium condition, will be understood with some degree of accuracy by a careful study of the following case, which was the first in which it was given as a remedy.

worse.

"1. Blood disease.-Mr. C. F-, a middle-aged and formerly stout and healthy man, seven years ago had an attack of typhus fever, recovered imperfectly, and has not been thoroughly well since; during the last five years has gradually but steadily become He vomits a great deal, but not food; the matter rejected is a sour, watery phlegm; he has diarrhoea, the stools consisting of yellow, frothy, slimy matter; the secretion of the kidneys is high coloured and thick (in some other cases it has been albuminous); he spits blood, and sometimes has hæmorrhage from the bowels; he has pain in the region of the liver and kidneys, and also in the lower bowels, with much cramp; the eyes slightly jaundiced; there has been great loss of strength and flesh, and two stones (twentyeight pounds) in weight. The tongue is not much furred, and the pulse is 80. This gentleman tells me he has had a great deal of medical advice, but as yet has derived no benefit either from medicines or from careful diet, or from change of air, having during the five years paid two or three long visits at the sea-side and also one on the Welsh mountains. This account I received on the 28th of April, 1858. I prescribed half a grain of the first trituration (one grain in a hundred) three times a day for a week, being moved to

this by the vivid recollection his narrative produced in my mind of the condition I was myself falling into while proving titanium. At the end of the week he wrote to me that he was "altogether a different man;" and, without any repetition of the remedy, and without the use of any other means, in a very short time, he regained perfect health. He continued well a year; in the spring of 1859 he made himself ill by hunting too much, and some of the former symptoms showed themselves again, but they were immediately removed by the same remedy; he has continued generally well since.'"

In the above, more than half the space is occupied with preliminary remarks, and from these we learn that only one, or, if there is no misprint in the passage above, at most two individuals were experimented on, viz., himself and Mr. Turner. From this meagre proving we have three short sentences as the whole physiological action of the drug, and in them there is only one peculiar symptom-viz., hemiopia, which is not taken into account at all in the subsequent therapeutic trial. Our readers are already familiar with the provings of Hahnemann and the many admirable treatises on the subject by Helbig, Hartlaub, Rau, &c., and the provings of new medicines by Hahnemann's immediate followers, and by our American brethren, and the re-provings of several medicines, wherein, as in Watzke's Colocynth, the subject is profoundly examined. It would, therefore, be an insult to them were we to go through the reasons that show the utter inefficiency of the above for displaying the physiological action of a drug. We may merely notice the paragraph in which Dr. Sharp states the blood is acted on, as that is the ostensible reason for using it as a remedy. How does he know Titanium acts on the blood? And if so, in what way? How does its action on the blood, supposing it to have any, differ from that of Arnica, Iron, Natr. mur., Crocus, Pulsatilla, Sulph. acid, and, in fact, every other profound and long-working drug? And again, what reason has he to suppose Mr. C. F. laboured under a blood disease any more than any other patient with any chronic disease involving depraved nutrition? And if so, what ground is there for supposing it resembled the Titanium blood disease any more than that of common salt or any of the hundred other medicines that produce changes in the blood? In short,

in what way was it a homœopathic cure at all? None, that we can see; and the cure was nothing but pure hap-hazard, and the repetition of the medicine in like cases will be pure empiricism, bearing no more resemblance to rational, specific treatment, such as homœopathy is, than Dr. Simpson's chance hits with Nickel and Cerium. We are therefore compelled, with great regret, in defence of our common cause, to repudiate entirely the above remarks on Titanium, as bearing no resemblance to a homœopathic proving, except as a mere parody of one. This is painful, but we have a duty to perform; and Dr. Sharp having the ear of the public, it is the more necessary to speak decidedly, as allowing such an imperfect representation of the matter to go unchallenged, will do infinitely more harm than all the letters of Sir B. Brodie. Dr. Sharp, at page 89, seems anxious that the allopathic party should not claim priority in the use of Titanium. We are not careful as to that; for, as above said, the field is open yet, and we cannot admit that any homœopathic title to it has been made out. So far, Dr. Sharp and Dr. Simpson are quite on a par in their trying new metals.

Dr. Sharp is most anxious to disclaim all indebtedness to Hahnemann, and he therefore seldom mentions his name without some disparaging remark. Thus he takes good care to tell us "I have noticed every feature of Hahnemann's exposition of his system, and there is not one which I admire, or can adopt in the terms in which they are propounded by him. As expressed in his writings, they all, without exception, excite in my mind a strong repugnance." And again, “I may be supposed to be a disciple of Hahnemann, and be held responsible for his follies. I altogether disclaim such responsibility and relationship." From this we infer that if Hahnemann had not. existed, Dr. Sharp would have discovered homœopathy all by himself. Possibly, but as it so happened that Hahnemann preceded Dr. Sharp in the discovery, we do not see how Dr. Sharp can altogether repudiate the relationship of his disciple. However, as he goes on, Dr. Sharp endeavours more and more to discredit Hahnemann, and make him an object of contempt. We doubt if any professed opponent of homœopathy ever gave such an unfair and depreciatory account of Hahnemann's intro