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When a person is healthy, his sensations and feelings modify as
per the circumstances and the actions are free and reflect the need.
But when a person is sick, the sensations get pathologically stuck.
Whatever be the situation, the same sensation will percolate to
all levels of existence. When the sensations are 'stuck', the actions
are also repetitive and a reflection of the underlying sensation.
For example, Sepia has that underlying sensation of emptiness -
uterus is being emptied, empty sensation in the stomach, fear of
poverty (which reflects empty coffers) etc. All the functions then
are reflection of this stuck sensation of 'emptiness'. There is
a desire to support the uterus (to prevent it from being empty,
come out) and there is need to hold on to the money (avarice).
Such a common sensation and its reflection in the action has been
called "The Verb". All the remedy pictures have been presented
in a way to bring out the verb from the plethora of symptoms obtained
in provings. If a verb is universal to a remedy, it should reflect
on both the physical and the mental plane. But in certain remedy
pictures (like Haliaeetus), the "Verb" seems to be derived
from mental aspects only. I really wanted to see how the "Verb"
of Haliaeetus would reflect on the physical plane.
The book ends with an effort to synthesize the "verb"
of the Syphilitic miasm and a history of Syphilis as a disease.
Sherr has not given any explanation of his verbs for Syphilis. The
synthesis of the verbs for Syphils seem to rely heavily on themes
from Syphilinum, Haliaeetus, Androctonus etc. There are some remedies
in which the "Syphilis Verbs" are not clearly apparent.
A more explanatory analysis of "The Verb" towards the
conclusion would have added more weight to this wonderful book.
As a last note, I must say that the inductive proving of Phytolacca
could have been left out. It seems out of sync with the original
provings and the remedy synthesis. It adds nothing to the book.
Another common aspect that runs through all the medicines is "medicine
in verse". Sherr has written some wonderful poems describing
the essence of each remedy. Being a poet myself, it was a joy to
read these well-written poems. I can safely say that these were
by far the best homeopathic poems I have ever read. The poet in
Jeremy is often visible even in the plain text that he has written.
The language is beautiful. The presentation is equally beautiful
too, with different shades of blue on different pages exciting different
emotions and an excellent print quality.
After having said all this, I must summarize my opinions: Dynamic
Materia Medica-Syphilis, is a beautifully presented and very
well written book. The concept of "The Verb" presented
by Jeremy in this book, makes it a must read for every homeopath.
The book is not just a source of information about our medicines
but it also teaches us the significance of various methods of studying
Materia Medica. The books leaves you hungry for more such works!
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