Homeopathy - History

18th-century medicine

At the time of the inception of homeopathy, the late 1700s, mainstream medicine employed such measures as bloodletting and purging, the use of laxatives and enemas, and the administration of complex mixtures, such as Venice treacle, which was made from 64 substances including opium, myrrh, and viper's flesh.^[37][38] Such measures often worsened symptoms and sometimes proved fatal.^[39][40] While the virtues of these treatments had been extolled for centuries,^[41] Hahnemann rejected such methods as irrational and unadvisable.^[42] Instead, he favored the use of single drugs at lower doses and promoted an immaterial, vitalistic view of how living organisms function, believing that diseases have spiritual, as well as physical causes.^[43][44] (At the time, vitalism was part of mainstream science; in the twentieth century, however, medicine discarded vitalism, with the development of microbiology, the germ theory of disease,^[45] and advances in chemistry.^[46][47]) Hahnemann also advocated various lifestyle improvements to his patients, including exercise, diet, and cleanliness.^[42][48]