Treatise on The Effects of Coffee

I have just offered to all civilized nations the French translation of a celebrated German work entitled: Organon of the Art of Healing, by Doctor Hahnemann, a work which has for its object the total reform of medicine, by bringing it back to simple and fixed principles, drawn from nature and experience, The treatise which, in these sheets, I offer to the public, is from the same author. Both works have an intimate relation; and, to use a comparison drawn from jurisprudence, the first is the principal, the latter is the accessory which serves as a prop and support to the former. It will, therefore, be necessary, in the first place, that I say a few words about the author and his Organon, in order to place may readers in a proper point of view.

Mr. Hahnemann is one of the most distinguished physicians of his time. Adorned with all the sciences, in general, necessary to a scholar, he is possessed, especially in medicine, of the most profound and extensive acquirements. A number of important articles concerning therapeutics and medical subjects, as well as several interesting discoveries in chemistry, have distinguished his name in the republic of letters, and a practice of half a century, consecrated to the services of suffering humanity, has given him a just title to the gratitude of his compatriots. The eminent genius, after having observed, during a long series of years, the curative process in use, perceived the inefficiency and uncertainty of the different methods adopted by the schools. He believed that the principal cause of the vagueness of medicine was to be found in the ignorance which then existed as to the specific and pure effects of medicaments. Convinced that medicinal virtues could be discovered, neither by chemical ana- lyses, nor by the taste or odor, nor by metaphysical speculation; convinced that the trail of remedies in diseases does not make us acquainted with their true nature, since the symptoms caused by the medicament are then confounded with the symptoms of the disease; finally, persuaded that the custom of nearly always mixing three, four, five or more in- gradients together rendered impossible all pure experience on the relative qualities of each one of them in particular, he resolved to Open a new course, without doubt the most natural, that is, to try the virtues of the various simple medicinal substances on healthy men, removing from them during the time of the trial all heterogeneous irritation. The remark- able result of his researches was: That each medicament produces in a healthy body a particular artificial disease, composed of more or fewer symptoms. This first step being taken, he proceeding to the second, that is, to apply to existing diseases such simple remedies, known by their pure and specific effects. It was then that he discovered the, great truth which forms the basis of his curative theory, namely: To cure a dynamic disease in the most certain, most rapid, mildest, and most durable manner, a remedy must be chosen capable of producing on healthy men a totality of artificial affections as nearly similar as possible to the totality of the symptoms of the natural disease in question.

It was by reason of this principle that the new curvative method received the denomination of the homoeopathic method, formed from the Greek words homoion and pathos, like and suffering.

After having followed this new course during her years ; and having always reaped the most happy results from it, Mr. Hahnemann hesitated no longer to publish his discovery in the first edition of his Organon of the Art of Healing, which was published at Dresden in 1810 by Arnold, book- seller and editor. A new edition, revised and corrected, appeared in 1819, and this is the one which I have just translated.

The efforts of the celebrated author were always crowned with the most brilliant success. He became the founder of a reformed medical school, and his name will live forever in the annals of science, as well as in those of humanity. Should any one become interested in the remarkable fortunes which the cause of the new doctrine experienced, he will find some curious details of it in my Expose of the Reform of the Medical Art undertaken in Germany by Dr. Hahnemann.

But this is enough to make my readers acquainted with the homoeopathic method. I return to my subject.

Whoever reads-with attention the Organon of Mr. Hahnemann will be fully convinced that all homoeopathic cures have as an essential condition of-success the observance of a particular diet different in several respects from that which the schools usually prescribe. The dietetic of the author is as simple and as conformable to nature as his curative method; and many persons afflicted with all kinds of sufferings and cacochymies have recovered their health by simply submitting to the regimen in question.

**Contents and Sample Pages**