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Vorwort:
Preface
The Collected Works of Arthur Hill Grimmer. M.D.
Edited by: Ahmed N. Currim, Ph.D., M.D.
I heard the name of Arthur Hill Grimmer (when I was about eight years old) from a relative who had been cured of a chronic eczema by Dr. Grimmer. The story was that this relative, a student in America in 1947, had visited the good doctor in Chicago in his office on State Street (which once was also the office of James Tyler Kent). Dr. Grimmer did a good history and exam and prescribed one dose of the indicated remedy Kali-s. in the CM potency. A wonderful cure followed after an initial aggravation of the itching for a few days. The eczema of some 12 years duration was gone within ten days (with only this one dose), never to return.
However, this story was forgotten, but in 1966 when I had become interested in Homeopathy, the name of Grimmer came into my consciousness and I tried to find him. It was through the kindness of Roger Ehrhart, one of the founders of Ehrhart and Karl, Homeopathic Pharmacists and publisher of Kent's Repertory, that I learned (in 1969) of the whereabouts of Dr. Grimmer. Dr. Gimmer had passed on about two years previously but his daughter was alive and well and I was successful in locating her.
In December 1972 during the Christmas vacation, I was able to journey to Florida to seek the company of my spiritual teacher, Kirpal Singh. Whether luck would have it or whether the guiding spirit of Dr. Grimmer and that of Kirpal Singh so willed I do not know, but I met with Audrey Grimmer Winthers, Dr. Grimmer's daughter. With the first knock on her door (from an unknown and peculiar math professor of foreign origin) there began a spirit of cooperation and love.
Audrey opened up to my idea of collecting her father's work both published and unpublished and bringing it to the Homeopathic Profession.
Audrey had many handwritten manuscripts of her father. and there was a large collection of them with Dr. Ruth Rogers (who had been a student of Dr. Grimmer). So I collected the manuscripts from both these sources. Thanks to the graciousness and trust of Audrey Winthers, I was able to collect all the manuscripts and arrived back at the university to continue my teaching.
I opened the three boxes of papers, many of them brown with time and storage, and looked at them with disbelief and wonderment and anxiety about my abilities to assemble from such a mass a work that could do justice to such a man who lived and practiced Homeopathy for over 57 years. How could I, at most a mathematician, without medical training do such a task. What had I undertaken to do?
Gradually, however, I calmed myself down and started the work. At first it involved only seeing the titles of the various papers and gradually I formed a plan to classify the various papers into various categories--Philosophy, Essays, Materia Medica, Special Diseases, Clinical Cases, Homeopathic Prophylaxis, Cancer and Electronic Reactions.
Then, in September 1973, I had the opportunity to enter medical school and so started the study of medicine at the University of Brussels. Every summer I would return to America for clinical rotations and during that time for three to four months I worked on these manuscripts. The manuscripts were classified, then a search would be made in the literature to see where that article had been published, then the hand written article would be compared word by word with what was printed. The errors in the journals were corrected using the original manuscripts. Each article was retyped. Audrey helped in the typing and other people who helped were paid by barter (their typing and my treatment of their chronic illness). Somehow the spirits of Dr. Grimmer and the Provider of all good and my Spiritual Teacher provided so that this work could get done. After six summers in 1978, the work was more or less complete with all the articles classified, verified, and a table of con-tents made.
We were all excited and were now eager to find a publisher. Audrey and I had mutually encouraged each other. The literature had been searched quite well and with my acquired knowledge of medicine I had been able to interact well with the material. I also felt free to add refer-ences to the main text. In one paper I included a clinical case of James Tyler Kent (not in the original paper) to further show the use of Cadm- s. in a case of cancer of the stomach. Appropriate rubrics from Kent's repertory (not included in the original papers of Dr. Grimmer) were included in some of the papers to make them more complete.
During my six years of study in medical school in Brussels there were many times I had "to endure privations, loneliness, hardships, temptations, despair, and the black form of fear in its numerous aspects. I learned to replace fear with faith and despair with courage and to develop a will that defied obstacles and frustrations." I must have read and reread Dr. Grimmer's farewell address, "Fifty-Seven Years in the Practice of Homeopathic Medicine" at least 100 times, as it would give me faith, courage, and inspiration during the dark days of medical school.
Just before my final exams for obtaining the M.D. degree in June of 1979, I attended the LIGA Congress in Hamburg and brought a copy of the manuscript to show it to various possible publishers. But my efforts in that regard were met with resistance. Most of the German and French Homeopaths had not even heard of Grimmer and were definitely not interested. A well known English publisher told me he "dare not have anything to do with cancer." And besides, "this manuscript was too long." I knew then that the time to send out the light of Homeopathic Healing from Dr. Grimmer was not yet and I would have to wait.
I returned to America to do my medical internship and hospital training from 1979 to 1983.
Towards the end of my residency in October 1983, I had the opportunity to speak to a group of Naturopathic physicians and students at the Naturopathic College in Portland, Oregon, of my Homeopathic clinical experiences in the (allopathic) hospitals where I did my internship and residency. A possibility of publishing Dr. Grimmer's work through the NCNM in Portland arose, but the effort ended in disappointment. Instead an unauthorised copy of the whole Cancer section was published without permission of Mrs. Audrey Winthers or myself, with all my additions and editorial comments, without any reference of where the material was obtained, with many changes of Dr. Grimmer's own words - thereby resulting in an inaccurate work of questionable scientific value. Some of the older Homeopathic physicians in America are aware of this. We were able to bear on this person to stop his illegal publishing.
The time for this work really came in 1993 when Reinhard Rosé and Peter Vint of the Hahnemann International Institute for Homeopathic Documentation (HIIHD) visited me in Fairfield. I had been telling them of the Grimmer project and how we need to bring forth this work to the Homeopathic profession. Whereas in 1979 there was ignorance about Dr. Grimmer and even a resistance to publishing this work by English Homeopathic publishers, there now was a keen interest.
In August 1994, the Hahnemann International Institute for Homeopathic Documentation had a memorable meeting in Florida with Mrs. Audrey Grimmer Winthers and an agreement was reached to publish these incredible writings.
It took 22 years from the time I first met Audrey Grimmer Winthers in December 1972 to August 1994 for the fruit to be ripe.
The work comprises of several sections - Electronic Reactions of Albert Abrams, Homeopathic Philosophy, Essays, Homeopathic Prophylaxis, Treatment of Special Diseases, Materia Medica, Clinical Cases, and Cancer. It should be read and studied as a whole. The articles in Homeopathic Philosophy bring out in an inimitable way the principles of Homeopathy as expounded by Hahnemann, but with the spirit of Dr. Grimmer; thereby helping us to understand further what the Master taught us. The section on Essays gives us the lores between 1900 and 1967 and gives us insight of the Homeopathy practiced in that glorious age when such Masters as Kent, Grimmer, Hering, Allen, Lippe, and Boger practiced in America and took Homeopathy to such heights, especially in the treatment of very serious chronic diseases. The Essays entitled, "An Autobiography" and "Fifty-Seven Years in the Practice of Homeopathic Medicine" are truly inspirational and should be read and reread by every Homeopathic physician many times throughout his lifetime. The essay on James Tyler Kent shows how Dr. Grimmer was influenced by this great master. The next section teaches us that the Law of Similars applies not only to curing diseases but also to prophylaxis and thereby gives Homeopathy an additional power in preventing illness (especially epidemics). In Special Diseases we learn of Dr. Grimmer's experience in treating alcoholism, cardiac disease, arthritis, and many other chronic diseases. The Materia Medica section is Dr. Grimmer's views of our remedies and gives another facet of our wellknown remedies and introduces us to some new ones that he had first introduced into Homeopathy. The section on Clinical Cases is a sample of the incredible work Dr. Grimmer did in such complex diseases as cancer, arthritis, heart disease, etc. and further illuminates the power of the similimum. The section on Cancer is an expose of Dr. Grimmer's special expertise and gives us indications to find the road ahead in this serious problem confronting us today. The section on the Electronic Reactions of Abrams was Dr. Grimmer's research into applying the work of Dr. Albert Abrams to an expansion of Homeopathic Philosopy and in particular using these reactions in choosing more accurately the remedy for those especially difficult chronic advanced cases. It is, as far as I know, completely new in our science and is unique to Dr. Grimmer. He tried to pass on this unique knowledge and technique and it is really a pity that nobody made use of these achievements so that much of the knowledge is lost. So today we have Dr. Grimmer's writings and clinical cases showing this new idea; but unfortunately no operational instructions to either make similar machines or use them effectively in choosing the remedies or further understanding the cases. However the editor has taken great pains at reconstructing all that was left in Dr. Grimmer's manuscripts with the hope that one day some one will be found who will be able to reconstruct what is missing.
a) I give the source for every article whenever it was published.
b) For all other cases I used the handwritten manuscripts in my possession, including an approximate date whenever possible.
c) I introduced international abbreviations for the remedies (exept in the articles The Polarity of Remedies in Relation to the Polarity of Disease and List of Remedies According to their Polarity (Magnetic))
d) There is an index of all the remedies mentioned in the book at the end of the book.
Life Sketch of Arthur Hill Grimmer
Born August 29, 1874, in San Jose, California, the oldest of nine children, of poor but thrifty and industrious parents. His childhood and playtime were brief in span and broken at intervals in the performance of certain chores in the household of every large family not financially able to hire servants. After his sixth birthday the family moved to San Francisco where he attended his first public school. When he was not in school mornings and evenings he sold papers to help swell the family budget. In pursuing the sale of papers, he covered much of San Fran-cisco, in saloons, restaurants, and other public places, and on trolley and cable cars as well; he plied his trade energetically and untiringly with all the enthusiasm of impetous youth. Two years later the family moved to Oakland, California, where he spent the happiest years of his youth. There he completed all the primary schooling he was destined to have. When he was 12 years of age his father decided to locate on a 160-acre piece of government land in the mountains of Northern California in Lake County, where the quicksilver mines are found.
"The 12 years that followed were rugged and adventuresome and beset with many difficulties and tribulations. Money and rations were scant and poor, but game was abundant and wild fruits and berries were plentiful. With a little flour, corn meal, coffee, and sugar we were able to survive the first few years of real hardship and privation and were able to procure some chickens and other poultry together with a few hogs and cattle. We learned to cope with the elements and vicissitudes of the changing seasons."
"The second year after our arrival my father suffered severe injuries from a fall and he was left an invalid for the rest of his life. This unhappy event added new responsibilities on my shoulders. I was 14 years old and had to leave my mother and younger brothers to care for the home and go in search of work in order to get a little cash to buy the bare necessities needed. My first job was on a large ranch, and after eight months of dissatisfaction, I became a mucker - shoveling the rock and earth dug loose by the miners for $8 per month, with board, which sufficed to help meet the needs at home. From this time on things became brighter for the Grimmer family, and in a few years three of my younger brothers were able to obtain similar employment, thus enabling us to add improvements and other comforts to the home."
"My father was a highly educated man and his most prized possession was his library which was made up of a wonderful collection of books on science and literature, together with ancient and modern history. I had free access to these books and made the most of the opportunity they presented for acquiring more knowledge. I read long hours every night, averaging five hours sleep from my 14th birthday up until my 34th year. This reading, together with my father's tutoring, enabled me to pass a successful high school examination.
"My father treated our family with homeopathic remedies by following Johnson's Family Guide, an excellent work. He had 60 polychrests, a good selection for many homeopathic physicians. By the time I was seven, I knew most of the indications of those 60 remedies by heart and at that early age I had the urge to be a homeopathic doctor." (Dr. Grimmer actually cured several people at the age of eight years).
"After we had lived six or eight years in the mountains, I met Dr. J.E. Hoffman of Healdsburgh, California. Dr. Hoffman was my real preceptor and never let up telling me I must go to Hering Medical College, Chicago and enroll under the teaching of Dr. J.T. Kent. He also fired my mother with ambition for me by telling her I was an unusual prospect for a successful homeopathic prescriber. He used to say physicians, like poets, were born, not made; but how he could visualize a great physician in the raw, uncouth youth from the mountains has always been a mystery to me. In early September 1902, a gangling, uncouth youth left his mountain habitat in California, on horseback, to begin the study of medicine. No visions of grandeur, or dreams of wealth or worldly fame disturbed the even tenure of his way; only a burning desire to qualify for the privilege of becoming a homeopathic physician and serve as a humble healer of the sick and needy inspired his every thought and effort. No sacrifice of time or worldly possessions, which were meager indeed, was too much to give to attain this precious goal set by a longing heart.
Well, he came and saw and conquered, in the language of the great Roman warrior, Julius Caesar. He conquered, not an empire or destroyed armies with their spoils of victory, but he conquered self by the grace of God, to endure privations, loneliness, hardships, temptations, despair, and the black form of fear in its numerous aspects; he learned to replace fear with faith and despair with courage, and to develop a Will that defied obstacles and frustrations. He cultivated the God-sent light of reason and intelligence to lead him on life's stormy highway in preparation for his life's work, the practice of medicine.
Four tedious, painful, but exciting years glided by and graduation day came, and the fledgling doctor, with many of his colleagues, was born and dedicated to the healing arts.
In June 1906, at high noon, he hung out his shingle, A.H. Grimmer, M.D., at 29th and Groveland Avenue, Chicago, to embark on a new career, the practice of medicine. From miner and lumberjack and farmer and "Jack of all trades", laborer, etc. came the sudden, startling transformation to a Doctor of Medicine, this coveted degree was a prize whose worth was priceless; yes, it meant opportunity and prestige and eventual wealth, but it really meant much more, a chance to serve, to comfort, and instruct in the restoration of lives from pain, sickness, and sorrow, to states of health and happiness. With these desirable boons came a deep sense of responsibility for the custodianship of other lives coming for help and healing and guidance. Many questions loomed, with but vague answers. Was he really prepared to meet the challenges and obligations imposed? Did he have the patience and equipment needed to successfully cope with the numerous trying situations coming up in this work? Only if the love of the work and its uses was strong enough could he be sure of success and happiness in its performance.
"Fortyseven years of homeopathic practice had made my life replete with much joy and few regrets, for the outstanding miracles of cure and deep satisfaction far outweigh the relatively few disappointments that come to those who really follow the law of faith, because faith in the law implies faith in God. Without faith the healer will fail, and without faith the sick will succumb."
Conclusion
The editor is deeply grateful to Audrey Grimmer Winthers for her wonderful colloboration and trust in allowing this work to be published by entrusting me with the precious manuscripts, trusting even during those trying and difficult moments these many years. He also is appreciative of the support of her husband William Winthers, her sister June Grimmer Bayler and her son Don Bayler and the whole family for their trust and support during these 23 years to the end of this project.
In conclusion we Reinhard Rosé, Peter Vint and the editor Ahmed Nooruddin Currim of the Hahnemann International Institute for Homeopathic Documentation are joyous and proud to bring this work of this great homeopathic master, Arthur Hill Grimmer, to the homeopathic profession, and pray for the blessing of his spirit that it go forth and bring the light of Homeopathic Healing to all the nations of our planet as was so earnestly the wish of Dr. Grimmer.
Ahmed Nooruddin Currim
Editor
November 20, 1996
