Observe a piece of manganese. It is without doubt the deadest-looking of all the metals. It is famous for a disease which, though not prematurely fatal, makes the patient who has it look gradually more and more dead - namely Parkinson's disease, in which one becomes progressively expressionless. Women with vacant faces, spastic gait, trembling; who feel well when lying down and wish they could spend the rest of their lives in bed; people who are a complete monotone, except for trembling and paralysis; festinating gait, increase of reflexes, tense soreness, excessive prostration, hysteria, inclination to walk backwards or sidewise like a crab; vertigo and falling backward; writes backward; frequent nystagmus: sad. anxious, fretful; full of hate: chronic hoarseness, dry cough, com- pletely relieved by lying down. Everything affects the ears, deafness in damp weather; asthma, aggravated by feathers. The Manganum patient is worse from motion, worse at night, from jar. from talking, before thunderstorms, and from bending backward. Relief from lying down, bending double, and eating. It has slow healing, diagonal pains, paralyses which extend upward, joint distresses which go crosswise. The menses of Manganum are frequent and scanty; there is intermenstrual bleeding, and the first menses may be as late as age twenty in pale chlorotic subjects. It is related to the syphilitic miasm, certain chronic skin diseases like pityriasis and lichen, erythema nodosum, and periosteal arthritis. It is a sovereign remedy for the results of encephalitis.
Antimony is in many ways like Arsenicum, but more drowsy; whereas Arsenicum wants to hold your hand. Antimony is averse to being touched or even looked at. Debility, fainting, pitiful whimpering, not relieved by rest. Children weep when angry: chilly and cold sweat, but worse by warmth; worse for lying down, sour things and milk; sooty wings of the nose; so short of breath they must sit up. or lie with the head thrown back; worse lying. They cling and want to be carried: the head trembles after coughing, the tongue is white and pasty with red edges. They may be bold, wild, mirthful and quarrelsome, and will bite. They have a shocking lumbosacral backache with a feeling of weight on the coccyx. No thirst. Quivering chin and jaws, craving for apples and acid fruit. The perfect remedy for pulmonary oedema and for exanthematous diseases with
deficient eruptions. There must always be a careful differential diagnosis between Arsenic and Antimony.
Combined with Sulphur instead of Tartrate, Antimonium Crudum shows a different picture: warm-blooded, complaints from overheating.
Resembles a pig; gross feeder, greedy, obese; solid, stout children who object to being looked at or questioned, who are angry at any kind attention, who are sulky, cross, and contradict. Worse for radiant heat, cold bathing, full moon, sun, the evening, sour wine, water, washing, and the acid which they love. Tongue as if whitewashed; cracks and fissures in the corners of the mouth and eyes, brittle deformed nails, horny warts and calluses, gout with gastric symptoms.
Ferrum Metallicum. the metal of Mars, one of the three basic remedies of Rademacher (the others being Cuprum and Kali Nitricum). Ferrum is one of the charming debutantes of homoeopathy, and can be found at any Junior League party together with her friends Cuprum, Ignatia and Pulsatilla. She gets no credit for being sick, for she has a pretty flush - false plethora. She is the sanguine temperament. She blushes and Hushes from emotion or pain, it is a great remedy for puberty and weeps and laughs immoderately. Its face alternates between pale and red. These girls are delicate and chlorotic. They are self-centred, haughty, proud and vehement. They quarrel easily and are worse from contradiction. Complaints from anger. They have no endurance. They have anxiety, worse from noise, even the crackling of paper, like Asarum. Dread of air. complaints from loss of fluids, like China, which is closely related. They have thoughts of death and are full of despair. They have complaints while eating, such as cough, vomiting in whooping cough, epistaxis. diarrhoea. Their vomiting is without nausea, like a leather bag emptying. They are relieved by slow walking, like Pulsatilla. Their aggravation is at twelve midnight and noon, like Sulphur. They are worse sitting, like Sepia. Aggravated in the winter, by rest, from sour things, and markedly from eggs; also from drafts and cold bathing.
There is an interesting aggravation from descending - Borax and Stannum are not the only remedies for this. Their pulse is full and yielding, and their muscles flabby. Their bones are soft. It is a great remedy for haemorrhage, especially from the lungs, which is bright and clots easily like Ipecacuanha and Phosphorus. Ferrum also has vicarious haemorr- hages. It is among the remedies for the most violent headaches, pulsating, without respite, for three days. It has vertigo looking at water, as when crossing a log over a brook, dizziness on sudden motion, descending, and from walking. It has the curious keynote of red face and thirst during chill. It is one of the profoundly constipated remedies, and very short of breath.
a leading medicine in exophthalmic goitre, and in deltoid rheumatism and bursitis.
Stannum - tin - the major ingredient of pewter, sometimes called
Plumbum candidum, white lead, and sometimes Diabolus metallorum,
metal of the devil, because it is so brittle and makes such a great noise when bent. It resists decomposition and does not rust. It is not affected by the atmosphere. Its atomic weight is 118, close to Antimony, which is 120. It is chemically related to Silica, the complement of Pulsatilla, and is often needed in Pulsatilla cases. Astrologicallv it is the remedy of Jupiter, and the ancients felt it controlled the liver. Its homoeopathic nickname is "the dromedary' - slow and sure. Its symptoms begin in the morning and very gradually get worse until the middle of the day, and then gradually recede. It is related to the pituitary gland; it is one of the hydrogenoid remedies of Grauvogel. It is supposed to make the etheric forces receptive to the ego. and like Phosphorus, make it possible for the ego to come more deeply in.
In looks the Stannum patient has the Jovian high brow, like Sir Walter Scott and indeed Hahnemann himself. Weakness is perhaps its pre- dominant symptom. The voice (which shows the ego) is so weak; the back is so feeble that the Stannum patient falls into a chair. She is emaciated and has enteroptosis. She is worse talking and especially worse laughing, and better with motion. Better also from hard pressure and better during menses. She is worse at noon or at 10 a.m. like Natrum Mur. Worse from touch and descending, also from drafts, change of weather, and cold. Sudden onset, as in Belladonna, is a contraindication for Stannum, which is gradual and slow, both increasing and decreasing in its pains and symptoms. It has a marked periodicity. Mentally it is a sad remedy, with aversion to men, unwillingness to answer questions, sadness before menses. It is a great remedy for neuralgias after the suppression of leucorrhea. It has complaints on Saturday or Monday. 'Monday constipation'. Its all-gone feeling is not relieved by eating. Cramps around the navel and colic are better from hard pressure, from lying on the abdomen, from doubling up and from walking, and are accompanied by colic with hunger. It has glassy leucorrhea, monthly periods early and profuse with concomitant malar pain. Prolapse, aggravated by stool. Knotty stool or urge to soft stool which it cannot expel, like Alumina. Its discharges are green, sweet-tasting and bland. Alternation of leucorrhea and neuralgia. It is magical in haemorrhage from the stomach. It has emptiness in the chest, feeble hacking coughs, three or four in paroxysm; worse at night, from warm drinks, from sunrise to sunset. Singers find expiring difficult. Exhausting coughs with knife-like pain in the upper
sternum brought on by laughing, and relieved by bending double. All the mentals of Stannum are relieved during the menstrual period. It is in general better lying on the back and lying on something hard. Lying on the stomach makes it sleepless. Stannum will often sleep with one leg bent up and the other stretched out and the head Hexed. It has hemiplegia with constant sweat of the paralyzed part. It has musty sweats, worse at 4 or 5 a.m. and a green sweat, worse morning and evening. It is worse before the changing of the moon. It has convulsions with the thumbs in. like Cuprum, and drops things from fatigue or weakness, not haste. It is a great remedy for worms. Its discharges are debilitating, like China. It is a safe and useful remedy for tuberculosis and bronchiectasis. Particularly is it helpful in the despondent tubercular.
Mercurius, the human thermometer, is lax. blond, alkaline. A volatile chameleon, elusive as quicksilver, which it is. We are told not to give Mercury in psoric cases. The Mercury patient has two sides, one brutal, ugly, cruel; murderers, suicides by shooting or knifing. Stupid, chronically ill, disgusted, morose, mistrustful, weary of life, treacherous. The other aspect is like the mythological god Mercury, the messenger and prankster among the gods. Mischievous, overbright without character, hasty, ineffective, timid, hurried. Averse to company, cannot talk well, slow to answer, poor will and memory, uncoordinated angular movements, drowsy, talks or groans in sleep. An important remedy for tremors; desires stimulants; frequent colds; slow to heal, ulceration plus swollen glands, mostly small and hard. Worse sunset to sunrise, especially worse from change of temperature. Sticky sweat without relief. Very thirsty for cold drinks, though with a wet mouth. Discharges are slimy, bloody, with pus, acrid. Worse lying on the right, worse in the warmth of the bed, worse from dampness, touch, pressure and motion. Exostoses and bone pains.
The tongue is typical, flabby, showing the imprint of the teeth, scalloped edges, metallic odour, mucous patches, decay of the crowns of the teeth, not near the roots like Thuja. Stomatitis, sneezing in the sun. iritis, photophobia, running ears, quinsy. The remedy for 'foundryman's glare'. Vertigo lying on the back; alternate hot and cold, alternate constipation and diarrhoea; bowel trouble, especially caecum, colon, appendix. Mucous colitis. Tenesmus, 'never-get-done' feeling. Bloody, shreddy dysentery. Nephritis. Sweat of the genitals, chancroid, secondary syphilis, menses excessive with swollen labia and acrid leucorrhoea. The ancients used to say "salivation is salvation'; Mercury is full of excess saliva, drooling at night and spraying when you speak. Red coppery skin eruptions, eczema, itching in bed, toxic trembling, paralysis agitans, bone sequestrae. sinuses, osteomyelitis, rheumatic fever, anaemias which do
not respond to iron or transfusions. High sedimentation rate. Fainting. There is a whole family of Mercuries of great value - Merc. Cor.. Merc. Cyan.. Merc. Dulc., Merc. lod. Flav. (proto-iodide), Merc. lod. Rub. (biniodide) and Cinnabar (red iodide of mercury). Compare with Podophyllum, called the 'vegetable mercury'. Everything in Mercury is worse from sunset to sunrise, it being a profound syphilitic miasmatic remedy.
One of the seven great planetary metals used relatively infrequently in homoeopathy is Plumbum - lead - related to the eldest planet. Saturn. It is a sclerotic, emaciated slow personality, atomic weight 207 - heavy as lead'. Mentally Plumbum is a thief, full of deceit, father of lies; a timid, anxious, restless, amnesic, demented person. Desperate anaemias, contraction of the spirit and body, relief by stretching. Backward or epileptic children: trembling paralyses, tendency to abortion, boring pains, fear of assassination, odd positions in sleep. One of our greatest remedies for intestinal obstruction. Give your remedy, whether it be Plumbum. Cuprum. Nux Vomica or whatever, summon the ambulance and the surgeon, call the hospital, and by the time the patient arrives there, in my experience, the obstruction or intussusception is resolved and no surgery is needed; it is also often the same with strangulated hernia. One of the leading keynotes of lead is as though the abdomen is attached to the spine with a string. Whereas the Belladonna abdomen is puffy and distended, the Plumbum one is retracted and concave; there is a cold sweat during stool and a singularly severe constipation, with a constriction of the anus and an unsuccessful urge; only small black lumps pass, like sheep dung. Lead is one of the greatest remedies for hiccup and the remedy for aluminium poisoning, as Alumina is for lead poisoning. Plumbum is one of the remedies for the 'ball sensation' - from the throat to the brain (compare Anacardium, Asafoetida. Ignatia. Sepia, etc.). Lead has a greasy face, like Natrum Mur. and Thuja, and colic with constipation, neuralgia and spasm of the rectum, neuralgia alternating with colic. Slipped discs and stubborn sacroiliacs and sciaticas, worse at night, better by exertion, like Rhus Tox.. but better from pressure and worse from motion; also worse from company. Cramps in peripheral arteries; paralysis of single parts, mainly extensor, preceded bv headache, blindness or spasms: heavy limbs: swollen tongue; partial epilepsy ending in sleep. Radiating pains. Contracted pupils: as if a string through to the rectum; hyperesthesias and anaesthesias; the patient is worse at 8-9 a.m.. and faints on entering a room full of people. This is a remedy of the deepest and most serious conditions; multiple sclerosis, progressive muscular atrophy, uraemia, gangrene, stinking foot sweat, faecal
vomiting, brown tongue with red edges. The patient feels cold from exertion in the open air. Plumbum is altogether one of the least attractive remedies.
Argentum - silver - the moon metal, is best represented homoeo- pathically in the nitrate, which is one of the three greatest geriatric drugs (the others being Lycopodium and Conium). Silver is the great rationalizer and has an excuse for everything; it is an exhibitionist; they buck up at once if someone keeps an eye on them. In order for this remedy to be needed, the mentals must be paramount (must really hit you in the face). It is a highly superstitious remedy - touches every lamp-post and steps on every crack. They escape into alcohol: they are spare, dyspeptic, shaky, off-balance, uncoordinated; they are the prize loud belchers, and enjoy it. There is fear of failure, and they often do fail (unlike Silica).
There arc errors of perception, as if one eye were enlarged: sensation as if the head were enlarged or empty. Headache relieved by tight bandaging of the head, like Silica, though in Silica it is the warmth that is wanted. Argentum Nit. has the nitrogen sticking pains; it has complaints from anticipation, especially diarrhoea, which is called firebell diarrhoea, and the stool is noisy, green, shreddy, and worse from eating and drinking, like Croton Tig. It has the chronic gastritis of alcoholics. The remedy is worse from warmth in any form, like Apis, lodum. Lachesis, Ledum. Pulsatilla, Secale and Sulphur; worse on the right side, worse eating. It is full of throat and larynx symptoms, and is one of the three greatest remedies for peptic ulcer (together with Kali Bich. and Uranium Nit.); in abdominal gas it vies with China. Colchicum and Lycopodium. It loves cheese and salt almost as much as Phosphorus, but its major passion (in fact, it has binges) is sweets, which aggravate. Six lumps of sugar in the coffee and a loud belch, and you think of Argentum Nitricum.