Lectures on Clinical Materia Medica in Family Order

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This work on Clinical Materia Medica by Dr E.A. Farrington is one of the classical works of homeopathic science. Farrington has given group wise discussion on drugs followed by few special chapters on individual drugs.

It is one of the first ever work on group study of drugs of Materia medica. There are also chapters on comparative Materia medica which are very exhaustive and borne out of author's clinical experience and fine study of homoeopathic remedies.

With the current trend of studying the 'families' of remedies it is interesting to re-examine this work which shows that there is not only new advancements in homoeopathy but a lot of matter is available which needs to be re-discovered. Farrington has also given cases to illustrate few remedies at various places.

Dr Ernest A. Farrington, was born on January 1, 1847, at Williamsburg, Long Island, N.Y. Under the preceptorship of his brother, H. W. Farrington, he matriculated in the Homoeopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania 1866. His articles have been published in the American Journal of Homoeopathic Materia Medica, the Hahnemannian Monthly, the North American Journal of Homoeopathy and various other journals. Dr Farrington was a homoeopathist by conviction. Even being ill with laryngitis in 1884, he, nevertheless, delivered several lectures after the throat symptoms had assumed decided severity. Later on aphonia developed and his disease worsened. He died at Philadelphia, December 17, 1885. His other valuable contributions are 'Lectures on Clinical Materia Medica', 'The Comparative Materia Medica' and 'Therapeutic Pointers to Some Common Diseases'.

DURING the year following the death of Dr. Farrington, the editor of this volume published several of the lectures here presented, in the Hahnemannian Monthly, North American Journal of Homoeopathy, and Monthly Homoeopathic Review. These were well received by the profession. Some of them were, moreover, translated and published in German, French, and Spanish journals. A number of physicians expressed the desire to have the lectures appear in the book form. The consent of Mrs. Farrigton to such publication were therefore obtained, the Doctor's manuscript was placed at our disposal, and Dr. S. Lilienthal kindly consented to revise the lectures after their completion in manuscript.

In order that the work should be thoroughly representative of Dr. Farrington, those conerned in its preparation for the press decided that the author's style should be closley followed. These lectures are therefore presented exactly as delivered, excepting where a change was suggested by his manuscript or by his published writings.

There have also been incorporated in the volume numerous abstracts from the comparisons in the "Studies in Materia Medico," published in the Hahnemannian Monthly in the years 1880, 1881, and 1882. These will be found in the lectures on Lachesis, Apis, Cantharis, and Sepia. The lecture on Moschus is essentially a reprint of the study of that remedy in the Hahnemannian for this addition of the above-mentioned matter of the lectures proper, for as Dr. Kornoerfer truly says in his memorial sketch of his deceased friend, they "belong to the classics of our school." The regret is that they cannot be incorporated in their entirety.

The reader must remember that in a course consisting of seventy-two lectures, it would be utterly impossible to include a complete presentation of the homoeopathic materia medica. This fact was always kept in mind by Dr. Farrington. It was his aim, therefore, to present to his students, only such matter as would enable them to establish their knowledge of materia medica on such a firm foundation that their post-graduate study of that science would be a comparatively easy task. How well he succeeded in his object can be attested by the many physicians whose fortune it was to receive instruction from his lips.

It should be said of Dr. Farrington's manuscript, that it gave marked evidence of constant study. Interlineations and notes of reference were frequently added. Erasures were few, for what he therein recorded was only placed there after having been thoroughly confirmed by the clnical experience of himself, or of some other competent observer. Fully did he realize the importance to homoeopathy of a materia medica which should be, in all repects, perfect.

**Contents and Sample Pages**