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These are the three names for the only liquid metallic element. It is used as medicine in more than a hundred different forms. The nitrates, oxids, chlorids and iodids are Thou salts most frequently employed in medicine. Other preparations commonly used are. blue mass and calomel, and in syphilis the bichlorid, the yellow iodid and the red iodid. Still other preparations are cyanid, the yellow sub sulphate, mercury and chalk, the plaster and the iodid of mercury and arsenic, yellow wash, black wash, corrosive sublimate, etc.
In the first few years, after the mercury has been absorbed by the organism, and while it is "wandering" in the circulation and in the tissues, it shows in the iris, especially in the upper half, as a whitish film. After five or more years it begins to condense into a greenish crescent of metallic luster on the uppermost margin of the brain region in the blue eye and of bluish color in the brown eye. In serious cases this greenish rim may extend all around the outer margin of the iris. The metal, on account of its deteriorating effect upon the skin, also greatly broadens and intensifies the scurf rim. (Color plate, Fig. d, p. 116)
It takes this treacherous, insidious poison from five to fifteen years to create its havoc in the brain and nervous system. "When this commences, unless radical measures are employed, it marks the beginning of the end--the development of locomotor ataxia, paralysis agitans, paresis, etc.
The first and secondary stages of syphilis mark Nature's efforts to expel the syphilitic virus; the tertiary stage is due to the destructive effects of mercury, iodin, potassium, salvarsan (arsenic), etc., on the brain, spinal cord and other vital organs.
"All wrong," exclaims the allopath, "these tertiary symptoms are due to syphilis, not to mercury."
To this we answer, "Not so; we have treated hundreds of cases of luetic diseases but not a single one has ever developed any tertiary symptoms."
Syphilitic cases under favorable circumstances recover under homeopathic or Christian Science treatment. If the highly diluted remedy or the metaphysical formula does not actually cure the disease, it at least does not interfere with Nature's cleansing, healing processes.
Treatment under our system usually lasts from three to six months and after this natural cure the patient's system is purer than before infection because the ulcers, discharges or skin eruptions have acted as fontanelles and the treatment has eliminated not only the venereal virus, but also other hereditary and acquired taints latent in the system.
On the other hand, we have in every case of locomotor ataxia, paralysis agitans or paresis, unraveled a history of some form of alterative treatment and usually found the corresponding signs of these poisons in the iris.
Says the allopath, "This talk does not amount to anything ; it is unorthodox and unscientific ; all our authorities contradict it."
Possibly; but the experience of thousands of patients, for twenty to thirty years slowly tortured to death, verifies it. Not even the fanatical inquisition nor the imaginative brain of a cruel Indian has ever invented tortures more inhuman and devastating than those inflicted by the "alteratives". How much more merciful would it be to give these victims of medical malpractice in the beginning a good big dose of an "alterative" and have done with it!
When you see vigorous, blue eyed manhood succumb in the prime of life to destructive diseases "which have never before been in the family"--think of the alteratives!
When you see a young wife, once the embodiment of health, fading away after marriage, a victim of mysterious ailments--think of the alteratives! Medical authorities claim that over fifty per cent of all men in large cities have been treated for venereal diseases.
When you see the offspring of a healthy mother made defective by scrofula, chronic catarrh, decayed teeth, epilepsy or idiocy--think of the alteratives! Anemia, rachitis and scrofulous constitutions in children are only too often due to the poisoned blood of their progenitors.
With every additional year of practice and observation my conviction is strengthened that drug poisoning is the most fruitful source of chronic and hereditary disease. Nature tries to remedy the effects of wrong living by acute reactions of brief duration, but three fourths of the most dreadful cases of chronic disease coming to us for diagnosis and treatment are caused by the suppression of Nature's acute healing efforts and by the destructive effects of poisonous drugs, vaccines, serums, antitoxins, and of uncalled for surgical operations.
Locomotor ataxia, paralysis agitans and paresis are man made. Nature never punishes and curses her children in such a dreadful manner. All such suffering is the result of human ignorance, prejudice and indifference.
Lest these statements appear exaggerated and iconoclastic, I shall quote passages from various allopathic authorities who consciously or unwittingly confirm my position.
A. Ross Diefendorf, M. D., is an authority on mental diseases in this country. He was formerly lecturer on Psychiatry at Yale University and a member of many medical societies.
His book "Clinical Psychiatry" is in common use as a text-book in many American colleges. It is interesting to note how unconsciously he confirms our claims that mercury and not syphilis is to blame for the entire train of so called syphilitic symptoms. On page 276 in the work before mentioned, Dr. Diefendorf says, in Chapter VI on Dementia Paralytica (Paresis) :
"Dementia Paralytica, or general paresis of the insane, is a chronic psychosis of middle age, characterized by progressive mental deterioration with symptoms of excitation of the central nervous system, leading to absolute dementia and paralysis, and pathologically, by a fairly definite series of organic changes in the brain and spinal cord, probably the result of some toxin, in the origin of which syphilis is most often an important factor.
"Etiology.--The disease is unknown among the uncivilized nations and is most prevalent in western Europe and North America, hence, it seems to be a disease of modern civilization. In America, the disease comprises from five to eight per cent of the admissions to insane institutions, but in some European cities, notably Berlin and Munich, the paretics average thirty-six to forty-five per cent of the male admissions. The disease is somewhat more prevalent in large cities and manufacturing centers, while it is relatively rare in farming communities."
Uncivilized nations do not treat syphilis or other diseases with mercury; therefore, we find among them no Dementia Paralytica, locomotor ataxia or paralysis agitans. These diseases are found only in localities of the earth where drug stores flourish.
Therefore, paralytic diseases are more prevalent in large cities and manufacturing centers where syphilitic diseases and consequent mercurial treatment are more prevalent.
Page 277,
"Negresses show a striking tendency to the disease; in Connecticut the negress paretics are ten times more prevalent than the female white paretics."
If negroes are free from the disease in Africa, as medical authorities state, but "show a striking tendency" to it in civilized countries, how can this be explained except on the ground that the disease is the product of unnatural treatment and drug poisoning?
"Our average age of onset in 172 cases is forty two years. Kraepelin in 249 cases finds that it occurs preeminently in middle life, as eighty one per cent of the cases occur between thirty and fifty years, the disease rarely appearing before twentyfive or after fiftyfive years of age."
Syphilitic diseases are usually contracted between the ages of twenty and thirty and it takes from ten to twenty years for mercury to complete its work of destruction in brain and nerve matter.
"Recently a number of cases of juvenile paresis have been reported occurring between the ages of ten to twenty years, in which hereditary paresis, syphilis and alcoholism are prominent factors. Clinically, the juvenile form is characterized by simple deterioration of three to four years' duration with numerous paralytic attacks, choreic disturbances, and paralyses."
Frequently young children are subjected to prolonged mercurial treatment on the mere suspicion that they have hereditary syphilis, or for curing eczemata.
Scenes like the following are of almost daily occurrence in medical clinics. A mother enters the clinic with a child whose body is covered with skin eruptions. One professor says the disease is of a scrofulous nature, another calls it, eczema, another hereditary syphilis. The mother denies that the latter disease has ever been in the family. The professor tells the students: "You can never believe syphilitics, they always lie." "We can easily find out," he continues, "whether this eruption is of a syphilitic nature or not. Put the patient for six months under mercurial treatment and if the eruptions permanently disappear, then the case is syphilitic."
Thus hundreds and thousands of people in civilized countries are innocently subjected to the horrible suffering incidental to mercurial poisoning without ever having contracted venereal diseases.
Another large percentage of paralytic and paretic patients have accumulated the mercury in the guise of liver and bowel tonics (calomel) and antiseptics.
On page 278, Dr. Diefendorf says:
"The disease afflicts chiefly the unmarried, and among the women especially prostitutes; in our experience prostitutes are fortyfive per cent more prone to the disease than other women.
"Among the causes of the disease, syphilis is statistically the most prominent. Its prevalence varies, according to various authors, from one and six tenths per cent to ninetythree per cent, but most observers place it between thirtyfour and sixtyfive per cent. In our experience it existed in fiftytwo per cent."
On page 288, he says:
"The character of the toxin and the sources from which it arises are questions still in doubt. Syphilis cannot be the sole cause of paresis, as long as it does not exist in more than thirtyfour to sixtyfive per cent of the cases. Furthermore, paresis, anatomically, is not a simple syphilitic process. Again the late manifestations of syphilis arise within a comparatively short time after primary symptoms, while paresis does not develop until ten or more years have elapsed after the initial lesion."
No, syphilis is not the sole cause of paralytic and paretic diseases and the character of the toxin from which they arise is not in doubt--it is mercury or some other alterative.
This is exactly what I have always claimed. Syphilis is an acute infectious disease, which under right treatment runs its natural course within a comparatively short time, never to appear again unless a new infection has taken place.
On the other hand, the history of people who never had syphilis, but who were poisoned by mercury in mine or factory, proves that it takes from ten to fifteen years before the poison exhibits its worst effects.
Professor E. A. Farrington of Philadelphia, one of the most celebrated homeopathic physicians of the nineteenth century, says concerning the destructive after effects of mercury, of which homeopaths have made careful study ("Clinical Materia Medica", third edition, pages 558-559):
"The more remote symptoms of mercurial poisoning are these: You will find that the blood becomes impoverished. The albumin and fibrin of that fluid are affected. They are diminished, and you find in their place a certain fatty substance, the composition of which I do not exactly know. Consequently, as a prominent symptom, the body wastes and emaciates. The patient suffers from fever, which is rather hectic in its character. The periosteum becomes affected, and you then have a characteristic group of mercurial pains, bone pains worse in changes of the weather, worse in the warmth of the bed, and chilliness with and after stool. The skin becomes rather of a brownish hue; ulcers form, particularly on the legs; they are stubborn and will not heal. The patient is troubled with sleeplessness and ebullitions of blood at night; he is hot and cannot sleep; he is thrown quickly into a perspiration, which perspiration gives him no relief.
"The entire system suffers also, and you have here two series of symptoms. At first the patient becomes anxious and restless and cannot remain quiet; he changes his position; he moves about from place to place; he seems to have a great deal of anxiety about the heart, praecordial anguish, as it is termed, particularly at night.
"Then, in another series of symptoms, there are jerkings of the limbs, making the patient appear as though he were attacked by St. Vitus' dance. Or, you may notice what is more common yet, trembling of the hands, this tremor being altogether beyond the control of the patient and gradually spreading over the entire body, giving you a resemblance to paralysis agitans or shaking palsy.
"Finally, the patient becomes paralyzed, cannot move his limbs, his mind becomes lost, and he presents a perfect picture of imbecility. He does all sorts of queer things. He sits in the corner with an idiotic smile on his face, playing with straws; he is forgetful, cannot remember even the most ordinary events. He becomes disgustingly filthy and eats his own excrement. In fact, he is a perfect idiot.
"Be careful how you give mercury; it is a treacherous medicine. It seems often indicated. You give it and relieve; but your patient is worse again in a few weeks, and then you give it again with relief. By and by, it fails you. Now, if I want to make a permanent cure, for instance, in a scrofulous child, I will very seldom give him mercury; should I do so, it will be at least only as an intercurrent remedy."
Dr. Hermann, of Vienna, has written several books in which he proves that syphilis is not a constitutional disease, that under proper hygienic living and treatment it is self limited, that it runs its regular natural course and when properly treated never produces any tertiary symptoms.
This I, myself, have proved in hundreds of cases. It is impossible to quote a better authority for these facts than Dr. Hermann. For thirty years he was superintendent of the syphilitic wards in the Hospital Wieden, near Vienna, one of the greatest institutions in the world for the treatment of luetic ailments.
He claims that during the thirty years of his incumbency he treated sixty thousand cases of syphilitic diseases without the use of mercury and that not in a single case thus treated and cured did he observe a spontaneous recurrence, an exhibition of tertiary symptoms or hereditary transmission. His work was done in a municipal institution to which the doctors and students of Vienna had free access, and thus was constantly under the closest scrutiny of the great medical schools of Vienna.
I take the liberty of translating some interesting passages from his book. "Es giebt keine constitutionelle syphilis"--"Syphilis is not a constitutional disease."
"Syphilis is as old as humanity. Its peculiar symptoms are described in the Third Book of Moses; the disease was well known to Hippocrates and Celsus and is minutely described by Tremelius and Beza as well as by many other writers of subsequent centuries.
"After the discovery of America, diseases of this type were found, in exactly the same form as we know them today, among the Indians. At the end of the fifteenth century they appeared as discharge or ulcer, with or without following figwarts (Condyloma), inflammation of the glands and skin eruptions. These always appear in direct organic connection with one of the original lesions.
"Until then, syphilis was looked upon as a simple local disease which ran its natural course without affecting the organism as a whole. It was thoroughly cured by hygienic, natural methods of treatment. There were no tertiary symptoms nor transmission to offspring. All the old physicians held this opinion; this is proved by the fact that up to the end of the fifteenth century constitutional syphilis is nowhere mentioned or described.
"In 1786 Hunter first spoke of its local and constitutional forms. He described the hard chancre as a symptom of the malignant form and originated the idea of constitutional syphilis.
"Ulcers of the mucous membranes, skin eruptions, inflammations of the iris and of the bones were classed by him as secondary symptoms. The later affections of the inner organs, of the liver, kidneys, heart, lungs, brain, nerves and blood vessels, hair and nails were looked upon as tertiary and quaternary forms.
"In view of these teachings of the regular school, the question arises: is the syphilis of former centuries another disease than the one we know? Is modern syphilis a new disease, unknown to the ancients, or were they lacking in diagnostic ability, since they did not suspect the existence of the constitutional disease?
"The ancient physicians were right. Syphilis, originating in the human organism, is undoubtedly the same disease now as then. It has not changed its origin and has always run its natural course without transgressing natural limits.
"The physicians of antiquity observed conscientiously and with understanding the course of the disease and treated it rationally, as a local ailment which never affected the organism as a whole."
These expositions of Dr. Hermann I can fully confirm. Of the hundreds of cases of syphilis and gonorrhea which have been treated by us from their inception (before any form of suppressive treatment had been applied), not a single one has developed constitutional symptoms or hereditary tendencies. Our natural methods of treatment purify the system from within, allow the disease to run its natural course, unhindered and unchecked. When under such treatment discharges, ulcers, inflammations and eruptions disappear, the organism is as pure as before infection, if not more pure. We say this advisedly; the natural process of elimination removes not only the disease virus but other hereditary and acquired taints as well.
On page 47 of his book, Dr. Hermann continues: "The disease conditions usually diagnosed as constitutional syphilis are the results of mercurial treatment or of other disease taints in the body.
"This I prove, first by clinical observation of the natural course of the disease, and second by the positive chemical proof of the presence of mercury in the system."
We have found the mercury in the ashes of the bones of mercurial patients. A patient is coming to us now who went through a course of mercurial treatment two years ago. The gold rings on his fingers turn black under the effect of the mercury which his system is now eliminating.
Page 48: "Among the thousands of luetics whom for thirty years I observed in the Hospital Wieden in Vienna and who were treated without mercury, not a single one developed symptoms of constitutional syphilis.
"Cases of so called constitutional syphilis that came to us suffering with ulcerations of the palate, mouth and nose, with bone pains, gummata of the brain and inflammations of the nerves, all had histories of mercurial treatment. Hundreds of electrolytical analyses of urine, sputum, perspiration, blood and other body materials revealed the presence of mercury, while a comparatively small percentage exhibited scrofulous or tuberculous symptoms.
"Thus it became clear to me that the entire chain of symptoms which are commonly diagnosed as constitutional syphilis are nothing but the effects of mercury in the human body.
"Workers salivated in the mercury mines in Idria, who never suffered with syphilis, exhibit all the symptoms of so called secondary and tertiary syphilis. In the blood and urine of these patients I also found mercury. In fact, the various forms of mcrcurialism everywhere occur among people who continually come in contact with mercury and thus absorb it; no age, no sex is immune. This is verified by physicians practicing among quick-silver miners, mirror, thermometer and barometer makers, etc.
"For these reasons chronic mercurialism is always prevalent in localities where, by physicians and laymen, syphilis is treated by mercury. Mercurialism is very common on the coast of the Adriatic, the Ost and North Sea and the Mediterranean, because in these countries quicksilver in its various forms is in common use as a universal home remedy.
"In large inland cities and sea ports, chronic mercurialism is much more prevalent than in country districts, because, in the former, syphilis and its mercurial treatment are much more common than in the latter. . . .
"The question naturally arises why, in spite of strictly scientific proof and of extraordinary practical results, these very teachings are not generally accepted and why the regular school has not examined officially my theory and treatment. The answer is evident. Ancient systems of medicine with all their errors, assumptions, superstitions and prejudices, are deeply rooted in medical science. The schools, blindly worshipping authority, have strenuously opposed strictly scientific investigations. The natural treatment of syphilis brings light into the dark labyrinth of the old system, destroys the nimbus of old school wisdom and the idol worship of quicksilver treatment.
"The world resents nothing so deeply and punishes nothing so harshly as the uprooting of dear old superstitions ; therefore the bitter opposition of the regular school to my teaching and my practice.
"What wonder that my enemies, in fanatical zeal, tried to oust me from my stronghold in the Hospital Wieden, when Dr. Hebra, according to his own confession, wished: 'That the hospital might be blown into the air.'
"In 1867, by means of unjust accusations, my enemies succeeded in procuring a government investigation of my work and my institution. In 1868, however, their machinations met with miserable defeat, for Dr. Hebra, the head of the commission appointed to investigate my methods, had to admit in his official report: 'That the government could sustain no objection against the anti-mercurial treatment of syphilis in the Hospital Wieden.' In justification of their own methods he added: 'Syphilis is curable without mercury but we give it because it cures the disease quicker and because it is harmless.'"
On page 83, Dr. Hermann continues: "Finally I retired, firmly hoping that for some time at least my methods of treatment, eminently successful for thirty years, would be maintained. But this last and fervent desire of my declining days was not to be fulfilled. In the holy place where, for a life time, I battled bravely against the abuses of mercurialism are now restored the altars devoted to the fetich quicksilver. . . .
. . . "The quacks and charlatans will again exploit the blind, foolish and superstitious masses and will again endanger and destroy the public health; syphilis will reappear in the horrible forms so common thirty years ago.
"The people themselves, realizing the terrible effects of mercurialism, must energetically oppose the false teachings of the schools, must bear witness to the truth and protect their bodies against contamination with the vile poison. In recognition of the fact that the mercurial treatment practiced by the schools endangers not only the individual but society at large, through its weakening and degenerating influences on our people, and especially on the younger generation, it is the duty of the government, legally to exclude mercury from medical practice."
Thus wrote Dr. Hermann, a graduate of the great medical schools in Vienna, but the work of mercurial poisoning goes merrily on until the insane asylums and homes for incurables can no longer take care of the harvest.
Poisonous drugs destroy brain and nerve matter and alcohol is made the scapegoat. Look closer, gentlemen, and you will find that in many cases alcoholism is an effect rather than a cause.
The diagnosis from the eye fully confirms our estimate of the true nature of the different stages of syphilis.
If syphilis in itself were a chronic constitutional disease, like scrofula or psora, it would exhibit its presence in the body by a special sign, but it appears in the iris only under the common signs of acute and chronic catarrhal conditions.
On the other hand, cases diagnosed and treated by the regular profession as secondary or tertiary syphilis exhibit the signs of mercury, iodin, potassium and arsenic (salvarsan).
A few years ago salvarsan was heralded as a positive cure for syphilis. Now, already (1918), medical authorities admit that the poison is not coming up to expectations, for everywhere they now combine the ancient mercurial and potassium iodid treatment with the salvarsan. The principal difference between salvarsan and mercury is that the former is more quickly destructive. Neither is curative.
A few years ago a man about forty years of age came to us in a pitiable condition afflicted with locomotor ataxia. Every doctor he had consulted was positive that he was suffering from tertiary syphilis. The Wasserman and Noguchi tests always proved "positive". Still the patient, as well as his mother and wife, denied strenuously that he was ever infected with venereal disease. The doctors of course were convinced that it was another case of "syphilitic liar". (Color plate, fig. f, p. 116.)
On examination I found in the iris well defined signs of mercury and I tried to find where and in what form Mr. K. had absorbed the poison. The mother admitted that she had been in the habit of giving calomel to her children, but I could hardly believe that this alone accounted for his terrible condition. Several months after I had made my first examination the wife of the patient came to me and said:
"Doctor, we know now where my husband got the mercury. When he was fourteen years of age his mother put him to work in the Pullman car shops. He was given employment in the mirror department and there he silvered mirrors for two years."
The "silver" on mirrors consists largely of quicksilver. The lad undoubtedly absorbed the mercury through the skin and through inhalation. The poison began to show its destructive effects when he was about twenty five years of age. At forty he was in the advanced stages of loco-motor ataxia.
This case, like many others, also proves that the Wasserman and Noguchi tests show "positive" in mercurial and other forms of mineral poisoning as well as in syphilis. Many patients are thus wrongly accused of being syphilitics because the doctors do not know how to differentiate between venereal diseases and drug poisoning. Such unjust accusations have frequently caused great humiliation, domestic troubles and divorce proceedings. The unfortunate victim of medical malpractice is thus robbed not only of his health but also of his moral reputation.
Mercurialism is easily curable while the poison is still diffuse in the system, but its elimination becomes more difficult when it has concentrated in the brain and spinal cord as indicated by the corresponding sign in the iris. (Color plate, figs, e and f, p. 116.) But many such cases well advanced in locomotor ataxia and paralysis agitans have yielded to our natural treatment. One such patient had had locomotor ataxia fully developed for six years. When he came to us he had to take, according to his own statement; a few dozen doses a day of some powerful narcotic in order to subdue the "lightning" and "girdle" pains. After five months' treatment the pains had disappeared and he felt well enough to quit treatment.
One of my first patients, Mr. S., was also a case of locomotor ataxia, fully developed for seven years. He was past the painful and in the paralytic stage. He could walk only with the aid of a crutch and a stick. The sphincters of the bladder and anus were partially paralyzed so that at times he could not control the movements of the bowels and of the bladder. After seven months' treatment he was able to work at the bench in a violin factory, and after eighteen months he worked as carpenter in the Pullman car shops. When I met him a few years afterward he told me that he continued to work during hot summer weather when most of the employees laid off on account of the unbearable heat. Such cases of course require thorough systematic natural treatment by all methods at our disposal. The curability of such a case frequently can be determined only by giving these methods a fair trial.
In medical schools students are warned not to use the word "calomel" in their prescriptions, "because people are afraid of it". They are instructed to write instead "hydrargyrum", which is the Greek word for mercury.
When the mother pleads, "Doctor, I do not want you to give calomel to baby," she is shown that calomel does not appear on the prescription; she does not suspect that "hydrargyrum"--Hg--is the same thing.
Why this deception? Because people look for instantaneous results. The doctor who cannot produce them loses his bread and butter. Homeopathy and other natural methods of treatment are not popular because they are regarded as "too slow". "Something must be done at once." The one who can most quickly move the liver and the bowels, run down the fever, suppress skin eruptions, ulcers and catarrhal discharges is the best doctor. In their anxiety for the loved one people will insist on "quick results".
Sometimes when sorely pressed in acute crises, even those who thoroughly understand the teachings of Natural Therapeutics succumb to fear and resort once more to drugs in order to produce temporary relief.
"I know you are right, Doctor. I do not doubt in the least the teachings of Natural Therapeutics, but I cannot endure to look any longer on this suffering. We will use the drugs just once more, and then stick to natural methods all the closer in order to eliminate the after effects."
It is the old story--"I will sin just once more, and then I will be good."
But the "once more" is frequently once too often. When Nature, under the influence of natural living and treatment has worked up to a healing crisis, suppression is dangerous and often fatal.
The climax of a healing crisis marks Nature's supreme effort to overcome a diseased condition, and if at this critical moment she is thwarted again, the healing forces of the system are not strong enough to overcome the new suppression, and a relapse into chronic disease or death itself are the usual results.
It is the anxiety for immediate relief which keeps alive the drug curse and which has turned true homeopathy into "mongrelism".
I once attended a clinic presided over by a homeopathic physician. One of the subjects was a young man suffering from a venereal disease. After the diagnosis and usual discussion of the case one of the students was ordered by the professor to give the man a thorough mercurial inunction.
I asked the doctor: "Is this homeopathic treatment?"
Smilingly he replied: "I suppose not; but these people want quick results. If we do not produce them they will go to the man on the next corner." This is also the excuse of the saloon keeper for remaining in his line of business.
The following description of mercury, as well as those of all other drugs in this compilation, their uses and their chronic effects upon the system, were compiled by our Dr. Jean du Plessis from the latest standard works on materia medica in the John Crerear Library. These data from allopathic sources prove that the destructive effects of these so called medicines are well known to the medical profession.
Allopathic Uses:
1. Caustic against luetic lesions and small skin growths.
2. Antiseptic dressing for wounds and ulcers.
3. Ringworm and other parasitic skin diseases.
4. Lues and chronic internal inflammations.
5. Alterative or intercurrent remedy.
6. Popular purgative in the form of calomel.
Accidental Poisoning:
1. Workmen handling mercury in mines, in the manufacture of thermometers, mirrors, etc.
2. Blue ointment. Grey salve.
3. Blue pills and other patent remedies for costiveness.
4. Amalgam tooth fillings.
Toxicology:
Circulates as oxyalbuminate of mercury, impoverishing both plasma and corpuscles.
Soon leaves blood stream to enter tissues, where it may remain indefinitely.
Symptoms of Hydrargyrism or
Chronic Mercurial Poisoning:
1. Salivation. Swelling and tenderness of gums.
2. Loose teeth--extraction followed by ulceration of sockets.
3. Mercurial teeth of Hutchinson found in children suffering from congenital syphilis, or according to Natural Therapeutics, from congenital mercurialism.
4. Dyspepsia. Diarrhea alternating with stubborn constipation--stools contain sulphid of mercury.
5. Mercurial eczema.
6. Ulcerations of mucous membranes and skin.
7. Softening of the bones, and pains in same.
8. Peripheral neuritis--girdle pains radiating down limbs.
9. Anesthetic patches.
10. Descending tremor progressing from intermittent with excitement and exertion, to continuous during waking hours only.
11. Impaired reflexes followed by various forms of paralysis such as locomotor ataxia, paralysis agitans or paresis.
Elimination of Drug in Healing Crises:
Takes place through skin eruptions, furuncles, ulcers, abscesses, various forms of feverish and catarrhal processes, open sores and hemorrhoidal discharges.
Ordinary symptoms of "salivation" and metallic taste in mouth are frequent symptoms.
Dizziness, nervous and mental disturbances are of common occurrence.
Signs in Iris:
While in the circulation it shows especially in the upper half of the iris as a whitish film. This, after five years or more, begins to condense into a greenish crescent of metallic lustre in the blue eye (Color plate, c) and of bluish color in the brown eye (Color plate, f). This greenish or bluish crescent in serious cases may extend all around the outer margin of the iris. The scurf rim becomes broader and darker in color.
A few days previous to penning these lines I examined the eyes of a patient which revealed the typical "mercurial iris" covered all over with a heavy whitish "felt-like" film. The outer margin of the iris was bordered by a heavy, black scurf rim. The scurf rim in turn was surrounded by the transparent bluish, greenish mercurial ring which encroaches upon the white (sclera) of the eyeball. The brain region showed the fine white crescent of destruction of brain matter, indicating paresis.
The patient denied having taken mercury in any form. After much quizzing he finally admitted that as a dentist he had for twenty-five years mixed the amalgam for tooth fillings in his bare hands. He is in advanced stages of paresis. This morning he tried to kill his wife.
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