PLAN FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF A 
HOMOEOPATHIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY. 
(Reprinted from The, American Homoeopathic Review, July, 1864. 
[At a Meeting of Homoeopathic Physicians held at Philadelphia, June 1st, 
1864, the following plan for a Homoeopathic Publication Society was adopted.] 
The undersigned unite in organizing a Society, to be styled the t: Homoeo- 
pathic Publication Society." 
1. The object of this Society shall be to facilitate and secure the publication 
of standard homoeopathic works. 
2. Homoeopathic physicians, members of the American Institute of Homoeo- 
pathy, of the Western Institute of Homoeopathy, or of any State or County 
Homoeopathic Medical Society, may become members of this Society on pay- 
ment of the sum of One Dollar. 
3. The officers of the Society shall be two Secretaries, one for the East and 
one for the West, a Treasurer and an Executive Council of five members, the 
chairman of which shall preside at the annual meeting of the society. 
These officers shall be elected every three years, by ballot and by proxy 
and shall hold office until their successors are elected. 
4. The fund resulting from the payment of fees by members shall be held 
by the treasurer to defray expenses of correspondence, &c., subject to the 
order of the executive council. The treasurer shall report to the yearly 
meeting. 
5. Works prepared for publication may be submitted by the authors to the 
Executive Council, which shall report upon the works by circular to the 
members of the society. Works not accepted by the Executive Council may 
be presented to the society at its yearly meeting, and be by it referred to a 
special committee, which shall act. with regard to this work, in the capacity 
of the Executive Council. 
6. When the Executive Council, or a special committee, as above provided, 
shall have accepted a work presented to them, they shall issue and circulate 
among the profession by means of the journals, or through the mails, or both, 
a prospectus of the work thus endorsed and accepted, stating its plan and 
scope and inviting subscriptions. 
7. With this endorsement of the work, and with the subscriptions obtained 
in response to these invitations, the work shall be returned to the author that 
arrangements may be made by him for its publication. 2 
The gentlemen present then signed the aforesaid document and became 
members of the Publication Society. > 
The election of offices being now in order, it was agreed that, inasmuch 
as the number of members present was very small in comparison with the 
number who might be expected to join as soon as the plan should be made 
public, the election should be for provisional officers, to hold office only until 
a general meeting should be convened after due public notice. 
An election was then held for provisional officers, with the following re- 
sults :- 
Executive Council,-Drs. C. Hering, A. Lippe, P. P. Wells, II. N. Guernsey, 
C.W. Boyce. Secretaries,-For the East, Dr. Carroll Dunham; for the West, 
Dr. E. M. Hale. Treasurer,-Dr. Henry M. Smith. 
The society then adjourned subject to the call of the provisional executive 
council. It is understood that the opening of the course of lectures in the 
Philadelphia Homoeopathic College will be celebrated with ceremonies of 
unusual interest, and that Homoeopathicians throughout the country will be 
invited to attend; that this opportunity will be taken by the provisional ex- 
ecutive council of the Publication Society to call a meeting of the members for 
the election of permanent officers and the commencement of business. Mean- 
while, in order to bring the matter before the profession, and to invite the par- 
ticipation of homoeopathic physicians throughout the country, the Executive 
Council issue the following 
Circular. 
Dear Sir,-At a meeting of Homoeopathic Physicians held in the city of 
Philadelphia; June 1, 1864, it was 
Resolved, That the want of good and reliable English literature on the sub- 
ject of Homoeopathy is generally felt; and that, to meet this want and to fur- 
ther the progress of our school, it is desirable to establish, at once, a Publica- 
tion Society. 
The physicians present formed a temporary organization, and elected a pro- 
visional board of officers, whose duty it is to call upon you, as one of the pro- 
fession, and invite you to become a member of this Publication Society. 
Members of the American Institute of Homoeopathy, or of the Western 
Institute, or of any State or County Medical Society, may become members of 
the Publication Society by sending their names to the Secretary of the East, 
Dr. Carroll Dunham, 68 East 12th St., New York, or to the Secretary for the 
West, Dr. E. M. Hale, Chicago, Ill., and by remitting to the Treasurer, Dr. 
Henry M. Smith, 484 Broadway, New York, the sum of one dollar. 
As soon as a sufficient number of members shall have joined to guarantee 
the success of permanent organization, each member will be notified by 
invitation to in the permanent organization of the society and 
in the election of permanent officers. At these elections members vote by 
ballot. If unable to attend the meeting in person, a member may vote by 
proxy. The officers will be elected for the term of three years, and will 
consist of one Treasurer, two Secretaries, one for the East and one for the 
West, and an Executive Council of five members. 3 
The Executive Council will examine such manuscript as may be offered for 
publication, and will accept and endorse it, or reject it. 
If a work be accepted, it will at once be announced to the members of the 
society, and this announcement will be accompanied by a request for a sub- 
scription for the work at a stated price. When a sufficiently large subscription 
list shall have been obtained, the manuscript with the endorsement of the ex - 
ecutive council and the subscription list will be returned to the author, who 
can then make his own terms with the publisher. 
If the manuscript should be rejected it will be returned to the author. But 
should the author be a member of the society, he shall have the right to pre- 
sent his manuscript again at the next annual meeting and to have it referred 
to a special committee. 
Among other works which it is contemplated soon to publish is a complete 
and correctly translated Materia Medica. 
(Signed,) Constantine Hering, 
Ad. Lippe, 
P. P. Wells, 
C. W. Boyce, 
II. N. Guernsey, 
Prov. Ex.. Council. 
E. M. Hale, Prov. Sec'y. for West, 
Carroll Dunham, Prov. Sec'y. for East, 
Henry M. Smith, Prov. Treasurer. 
Philadelphia, June 25, 1864. 
f 
It is most earnestly hoped that this effort may result in the publication of 
works of solid merit and correct execution-works on which the practitioners 
may rest in confidence that their statements are correct, and that they com- 
prise all that is known on the subject. To this end it is necessary that phy- 
sicians throughout the country give their hearty support to the enterprise. 
The only payment required is the initiation fee of One Dollar to defray the 
expenses of correspondence, circulars, etc. When a work is ready for pub- 
lication and accepted, members will be called upon to subscribe for it at a 
stated price. No such call will be made unless the work is actually ready 
for the press. Those who are familiar with the studies in Materia Medica, 
which Dr. Hering has been making for thirty years past, who know the extent 
which he has gathered and collated all that is known of our remedies, 
adding to what has been already published in books and journals, vast quanti- 
ties of observations never yet made public-who know, too, that in no other 
way save through the medium of a publishing society is this treasury of 
knowledge likely ever to be opened to us-will most gladly take part in the 
permanent organization of this Publication Society. 
It may not be improper to state that the first part of Dr. Hering's work is 
now prepared for the press, and will be laid before the executive council as 
soon as permanent officers shall have been elected. How soon this will be 
must depend on the alacrity with which homoeopathic physicians respond to 
the invitation to become members of the Society. 
C- Dunham, M.D., Secretary. 4 
Proposal to Publish a Standard Work on Materia Medica.-The 
original observations on which our materi i medica is based, the results of 
provings as well as the results of practice, are scattered about in our litera- 
ture. Since Hahnemann gave us his " Arzneimittellehre'' in six volumes, 
and its continuation in the four volumes of his ""Chronic Diseases," no larger 
work has appeared ; and after Hahnemann's death no new edition of any of 
his works was published. 
In the meantime Homoeopathy has had a great number of journals, besides 
hundreds of smaller and larger works; has spread from Germany to France 
and Italy, to England and Spain, and has particularly been adopted by thou- 
sands in America. Provingshave been made, and re-provings (nachprufun- 
gen); but all these valuable observations are scattered about in journals and 
books. The difficulty which homoeopathic practitioners experienced in getting 
" posted up," increased from year to year until it became an impossibility. 
Extracts took the place of the original and complete reports of provings ; 
the period of Jahr, Noak and Trinks, Possart and the period of repertories 
set in. 
The intention of all such books was to enable physicians to find, for each 
case before them, the nearest corresponding medicine, as the one 'tfhich would 
most likely cure. They not only collected what was wfattered and inaccessible 
except t6 the few; they also shortened and condensed. They aimed to make 
it easier, but in this the same mistake was made that physicians make in 
ordering the extract of a pound of flesh, supposing that, if swallowed, it 
would give the same nourishment as the same pound of flesh properly pre- 
pared, cut, chewed and gradually digested by the stomach. It never will do 
such a thing, and never has done it. Besides that, the experience of the last 
twenty-five years has more than sufficiently proved, not only how incomplete 
and inefficient all such books are, but also, how injurious to our art. The 
period may have been a necessary one, an intermediate transition state of our 
art, but it has decidedly not favored mastership in the materia medica of our 
school. 
All such books were shorter, and of course ought to have saved time; but, 
on the contrary, it took more time to find in them what we wanted. A large 
dictionary, well arranged, saves time, while with a condensed smaller one we 
lose time by fruitless search. 
All such books seemed also cheaper, but still our literature became more 
and more expensive through them; when editors and publishers made arrange- 
ments to save a few dollars in the printing of them-for instance by letting the 
symptoms run on in the same line, or by a horrible number of abbreviations- 
our eyes and our minds were tortured by using such books, and we not only 
lost time, but even our willingness to look over the mass, and to compare and 
become familiar with what is the most important in our art, i. e. with the 
minutiae. 
Whereas our eyes could glide over the large number of symptoms, if singly 
printed, with the same ease with which a bird, soaring in the air, views the 5 
field and its farrows, we now stumble .along and totter about, more like turtles 
ashore or terrapins on ploughed ground; and when once we fall on our back it 
is hard work to get upon our feet again. 
But the worst of all is the dependence in which we are placed. We depend 
upon the views and notions of the individual who prepared the extract. We 
are, in this respect, like birds caged in and hung up against the wall, to be fed 
with whatever our master pleases to let us have. 
A llomoeopathician will never learn to master the materia medica, overlook- 
ing and commanding the whole, as a general does the regiments of his army, 
as long as he is dependent on such extracts. 
Thus it is a large work that we need, containing all that has been obtained 
thus far, and as complete as it can possibly be made, spaciously printed, 
arranged for; the eyes, facilitating the operation of the mind through them, 
and enabling everyone to look over it quickly and with ease, and to find parti- 
culars when wanted. 
Having been engaged for the last twenty-five years, by daily additions and 
arrangements, in the preparation of such a work, we presume that the main 
objection-in fact the only one-to publishing it, might be the high price. 
Books for everybody are cheap; books for a minority, and therefore for phy- 
sicians in general, must bring a higher price; books only for a minority among 
the physicians, consequently, the highest. Thus no publisher could undertake 
a work of such extent. The only way is to do without a publisher, to have it 
printed for subscribers, and at their expense, and in order to avoid all risk, 
the first edition of at least five hundred, if possible one thousand copies, to 
such only as prepay. This will make it one of the cheapest books of its kind. 
Thus, under the following 
Conditions. Every subscriber giving his full name and residence, and pay- 
ing in advance not less than five dollars, receives a check, and for every 
additional five dollars a separate check. For such checks every agent of the 
work is bound to give to bearer, at any time when presented, as many sheets 
of the work as have been printed after the date of said check, for cost price, 
free by mail, in the form of a journal or newspaper. Said cost price consists of 
one per thousand, or in case of a smaller number of subscribers, one and a 
half or two per thousand of (the cost of) stereotyping the plates for each sheet, 
and the price of paper and printing, and the mailing of it by sheets. If bind- 
ing is ordered, the original cost of the same is added. An account of 
expenses in full is to be given on the cover. 
Every subscriber will receive as many sheets as are paid for in advance, 
and a notification of the period when his subscription runs out. No credit to 
be given, not even to the publisher himself,who must pay in advance for every 
copy he wants besides the proof sheets. 
No free copies shall be sent to editors or publishers. The trade price after- 
wards is to be double the cost price, the plates and copyright becoming the 
property of the editor. Every subscriber is invited to send by mail, in legible 
letters, his views, propositions and preferences; every such letter will be duly 
acknowledged and answered on the cover. 
Additions from trustworthy colaborers are welcome, *_and will be added; 6 
contributors receive a fee after the publication of the work is secured, by 
checks for the work, not cash. 
The Plan of the Work. The work will be published in monographs, the 
main medicines and those most proved each in a separate volume, and the 
clinical experience given separately. 
The smaller, less known medicines are to be given in families and the clinical 
observations united with the symptoms in the same schema. When the smaller 
provings make it desirable, the symptoms of several families with their more or 
less known drugs shall be placed together in one volume. The main rule shall 
be to publish what is ready for the press as soon as the money for printing has 
been advanced. As nearly as possible the order is to be the following: a chem- 
ical drug, a plant and drug of animal origin, alternately, and in each kingdom 
to follow the natural order. 
The whole work will, even in a few years, show, like the map of a newly 
discovered world, how far our explanations have been extended and what 
still remains for us to do. 
The first number will contain the schema, fully elaborated, in German and 
English, serving as a key to the whole work and at the same time as a glos- 
sary to settle all the difficulties of translation. As the majority of provings 
thus far were originally written in German, and as now the majority of hom- 
oeopathic physmians speak the English tongue, it has been thought best to 
use both languages in opposite columns, facilitating at the same time a famil- 
iarity with both languages. 
The first volume will contain Sulphur, all the symptoms given by Hahne, 
mann, by the Austrian provers and others, arranged according to the schema- 
like all other drugs afterwards. 
As another series of monographs, which will be separately announced as 
soon as a sufficient number of colaborers are secured to be able to continue 
the publication with an equal promptitude to that which can be promised in 
regard to the first series, a history of each of our proved drugs will be given, 
in the manner first introduced by Dr. Stapf and afterwards adopted by Dr. 
Franz, Dr. Seidel, Dr. Noak and particularly by the Austrian provers ; a 
history containing the introduction of the drug into Materia Medica, its appli- 
cation according to the different opinions of the older schools and cases of 
poisoning, if there are such, etc. To this will be annexed all the day-books 
of the provers as far as they can possibly be obtained. 
Such a work would be a real basis to Materia Medica, as a science, in the 
same measure as our first series will be the basis of our art as an art of 
healing. 
Repertory. A repertory according to the same schema has also been in 
preparation for several years, based upon the manuscript of the Materia 
Medica, and shall be printed in parts according to the main divisions ; the 
first part, containing the mental symptoms, will be arranged by Dr. Raue as 
the most efficient colaborer in this psychological part, and shall be printed as 
soon as finished. It will be considered as belonging to the Materia Medica 
and will be sent to all the subscribers without further notice. Notwithstand* 7 
ing the high prices at this moment, the work may be delivered to the first 
thousand prepaying subscribers, in the large dictionary size, like Allibone's 
Biographical Dictionary, at an approximately (not binding) estimated cost of 
one sheet for ten or fifteen cents ; for five dollars prepaid the subscriber may 
receive at least thirty, or if the number of subscribers amount to one thousand 
or if paper becomes cheaper, as many as fifty sheets. Renewing the sub- 
scriptions once or twice every year, within a few years every subscriber will 
be in possession of the completest work on Materia Medica which has ever ap- 
peared, and of which the trade price may be very nearly one hundred dollars. 
A homoeopathic practitioner will not be consideied as fitted out for his pro- 
fession without this work. 
Constantine Hering. 
Philadelphia, July 4th, 1864. 
[American Ilomceopathic Review, August, 1864.]