- TESTE A, GROUP REMEDIES, GROUP XIII, LYCOPODIUM CLAVATUM
 Wolf’s-foot
 - Genus, lycopodium, ranged among the mosses by Linne and Jussieu, but transformed by modern botanists into a distinct family of plants.
 - This cryptogamous and creeping plant, like all the other plants of the same family, grows in the north of Europe, in stony, mountainous and covered regions.
 - It has its name from the shape of its root, which reminds one of a wolf’s foot, (from the Greek words pous, foot, and lycos, wolf.)
 - It has the appearance of a tall moss.
 - It bears long club-shaped spikes, which drop, towards the end of fall, a yellow, granular, light inodorous, insipid, inflammable powder, which to fire-workers under the name of vegetable sulphur, and is considered by botanists as the pollen of the plant under consideration; it is this powder that is used in medicine.
 - “Until recently,” says Hahnemann, “it had only been used for the purpose of imitating lightning, (in theatres,) because it catches fire when a burning body comes near it; of wrapping up pills composed of substances that would adhere to each other without such a precaution; and for the purpose of preventing the painful effects of friction on the excoriated or chapped parts of the body.
 - Lycopodium floats on top of liquids without dissolving, etc.
 - In its gross, natural condition, it has scarcely and medicinal effect on man; at any rate, the statements of ancient authors concerning the effects of lycopodium have not been confirmed by modern experience; on the contrary, modern pathologists doubt the truth thereof.”*
 - But of how many other drugs have the medicinal properties been doubted by modern authors ?
 - Does this show that the medicinal history of these drugs is without any interest for us, and that all the clinical indications of the ancients should be rejected as fables ?
 - I do not believe that this opinion would be shared by many homoeopaths devoted to serious studies.
 - Lycopodium has, therefore, like most other therapeutic agents, its traditional history, which seems to me the rather curious that it confirms the results of our physiological provings of this drug.
 - Empirical applications.
 - According to Welshand Vicat, quoted by Murray,* a decoction of lycopodium causes vomiting.
 - It is true, this is said of the entire plant, not merely its pollen; but we know from our provings that the dynamised pollen likewise has this effect.*
 - As regards the external use of the powder of lycopodium in intertrigo of children or fat individuals, it is known to every body.
 - But does lycopodium, in such a case, simply exercise, as is generally believed, a desiccative, purely mechanical action, not possessing any specific relation whatsoever to the disease ?
 - I do not think so.
 - Indeed, Rosenstein found, that after having mixed the powder with lard, and making a sort of ointment of it, it still preserved, in spite of this alteration of its physical properties, its efficacy against intertrigo and the chapping of children.
 - He even employed the same ointment for serpiginous ulcerations of the hairy scalp, legs, etc., sometimes with the most satisfactory results.
 - This shows that the powder of lycopodium modifies and cures certain affections of the skin.
 - Internally, this power has been praised by Wedel, Lentilius, Gesner, and several other practitioners, 1st, for the calculi.
 - What homoeopathic physician does not see that this mode of treatment was not founded upon some of the real properties of lycop. ?
 - “Internally,” say Merat and Delens, “lycopodium has been given for rheumatism, retention of urine, nephritis, epilepsy; it was regarded as an anti-spasmodic, and as a useful remedy in pulmonary diseases, whence the name pulmonaria or poumonaria, that was formerly given to this plant.” *
 - According to the same authors, the Polish physicians powder with lycopodium the hair of those who are afflicted with plica polonica, and obtained good effects from this process.
 - This is not entirely correct; for it is a decoction of the entire plant, to be employed internally, and also externally as a lotion; this has been recommended for plica.
 - According to Vicat, no treatment is more serviceable in this horrible affection that the use of lycopodium. *
 - We pray the Polish homoeopaths to enlighten us concerning this important matter.*
 - Homoeopathic applications.
 - Lycop. seems to be particularly suitable for the affections of females, or rather of persons of mild disposition, leuco-phlegmatic, and given to melancholy.
 - It seems to act primarily on the digestive organs, and not so much on the stomach as on the larger and smaller intestines.
 - As Bryonia seems to correspond more particularly to acute and chronic affections resulting from the excessive use of a strong and exclusively animal diet, so the lycopodium seems to represent by the totality of its symptoms the series of functional disorders, and of the organic alterations arising from them, which are caused by the abuse of heavy farinaceous and fermentable food.
 - As a general rule, no drug is better adapted to indigestions caused by fresh or half-baked bread, or by the abominable pies, cakes, butter-crackers, etc., with which so many adults and children stuff themselves.
 - Such indigestions are characterised by redness and bloating of the face, succeeded at intervals by excessive paleness; syncope; vomiting, first of phlegm, afterwards of the ingesta, followed by cutting colic and several soursmelling stools, and a good deal of flatulence; lastly, shuddering, mingled with heat and sweat.
 - The constipation which often follows a violent, though short-lasting diarrhoea in these affections, is likewise a well-known and characteristic symptom of lycopodium.
 - In some very acute diarrhoeas of children, this agent, which is generally given for constipation, has likewise proved very efficacious.
 - But it is principally in chronic affections that lycopodium is useful; Hahnemann-recommends it for the following conditions : Melancholy; chagrin; anxiety, with desire to weep; dread of being left alone; irritability; extreme sensitiveness; capricious mood; difficulty of thinking and attending to mental labor; vertigo, especially when stooping; headache as from a deranged stomach; when walking, every step rebounds in the head, as if the head would split; headache caused by adverse events; pressive, tensive headache; paroxysms of tearing pain at the top of the head, at the forehead, temples, eyes, nose; tearing in the forehead every afternoon; headache at night, at the outer head; heaviness of the head; rush of blood to the head, in the morning, when rising, followed by headache; gnawing itching and profusely suppurating eruption on the hairy scalp; baldness; smarting in the eyes; stitches in the eyes, especially in the evening, at candle-light; itching heat at the upper lid; ophthalmia; blepharophthalmia; myopia; presbyopia; dimness of sight, as from feather-dust; flickering and dark spots before the eyes; buzzing in the ears; hardness of hearing; crusts in the nostrils; nosebleed; swelling and tension of the face; frequent flashes of heat in the face; itching eruption in the face; freckles; toothache, with rheumatic catarrh of the face; toothache after eating; dry mouth, without thirst, hindering the motion of the tongue and embarrassing the speech; coated tongue; chronic sore throat; mercurial ulcers in the throat; dry throat; with thirst at night; phlegm in the throat; slimy taste in the mouth, early in the morning; bad taste in the mouth; loss of taste; bitter mouth, in the morning, with nausea; excessive hunger; loss of appetite after eating the first mouthful; deficient appetite; canine hunger; aversion to boiled and warm food; aversion to rye bread and meat; marked taste for sweet things; indigestion caused by heavy food, (pastry, etc.,) difficult digestion of the milk, it causes diarrhoea; malaise during a meal, with sweat on the forehead; acid mouth after eating; hiccough, sour or fat eructations; dull beating of the heart during the digestion; violent eructations in the afternoon; malaise at the stomach, in the morning; frequent, continual nausea; nausea when riding in a carriage; weight at the stomach, before breakfast and after eating; swelling of the epigastrium, which is painful to the touch; circumscribed and seated pains, similar to those which are caused by flatulence, that is incarcerated under the false ribs; pain above the navel, when touching the part; fulness in the stomach and lower abdomen; tightness in the hypochondria; dull and stitching pain in the liver, after eating; pain, when walking, in the upper part of the right hypochondrium, as if the suspensor ligament of the liver would tear;* painful meteoritic distension of the abdomen; induration in the abdomen; pinching pain in the hypogastrium, cutting off the respiration; lancinating, pinching pain in the hypogastrium, which seems to be seated in the region of the bladder, and descends to the urethra, in the evening, in bed; pinching in the abdomen; pinching in the right side of the abdomen; cutting colic; cutting colic in the upper part of the abdomen, (especially after drinking wine, even when mixing it with a good deal of water); tearing in the sides of the epigastrium and in the groins as far as the thighs; burning in the lower abdomen; deficient emission of flatulence; gurgling in the left side of the abdomen; borborygmi in the abdomen; serious diarrhoea, with frequent and scanty evacuations, hot fever and distension of the bowels, in children at the breast; unsuccessful urging to stool; hard stool with straining; constipation lasting several days; chronic constipation; lumbrici; pin-worms in the rectum; pain at the anus after eating and after stool; itching at the anus; tension at the anus; incisive pain in the rectum and bladder, urging to urinate; frequent urging to urinate; gravel; haemorrhage from the urethra; itching in the urethra during and after the emission of urine; feeble erections; absence of all involuntary emissions; swelling of the testicle of long standing; excessive nocturnal emissions; deficient sexual desire; impotence of several years’ standing; aversion to sexual intercourse; excessive desire for sexual intercourse; immoderate desire for sexual intercourse every night; too sudden ejaculation of semen; profuse menses, which last too long; suppression of the menses by fright; melancholy and sadness previous to the menses; itching, heat, gnawing at the vulva; expulsive pressure in the genital organs, when stooping; stinging pain in the labia majora, when lying down; discharge of flatulence from the vagina; leucorrhoea; leucorrhoea preceded by cutting pains in the epigastrium.
 - Fluent coryza; coryza with cough and hoarseness; stuffing and obstruction of the nostrils; formication in the wind-pipe, at night; dry cough in the morning for years; dry cough day and night; cough after drinking; painful cough; cough which affects the chest; loose cough; cough with spitting of pus; phthisis pulmonalis; short breathing of children; constant oppression, with suffocation on doing the least work; stitches in the left side of the chest; contusive pain at the chest; beating of the heart (in the evening, in bed); hepatic spots on the chest; stitches in the sacrum, on raising one’s-self after stooping; pain in the loins, at night; tearing in the shoulders; pulling in the nape of the neck, as far as the occiput, day and night; stiffness of the nape of the neck; stiffness of one side of the neck; swelling of the sub-maxillary glands; pulling pain in the arms; twitchings in the arms during sleep, in the afternoon; nocturnal bone-pain in the arms; numbness of the arms on raising them, or at night; deficiency of strength in the arms; nightly pain in the bones of the arms; arthritic stiffness of the wrist; numbness of the hands; dryness of the skin of the hands; cracks in the finger joints; redness, swelling and arthritic tearing at the finger-joints; stiffness of the fingers caused by arthritic nodosities; stiffness of the fingers while engaged at work; numbness of the little finger; tearing in the hips, knees or insteps, most frequently in the evening and at night; rheumatic pains in the legs, at night; rheumatic pains in the bend of the knee, in the evening; stiffness of the knee; swelling of the knee; burning and smarting itching at the bend of the knee; burning at the legs; contractive pain in the calves, when walking; former ulcers at the legs, with tearing pain at night, itching and burning swelling of the ankle; cold feet; cramps in the feet; cold sweat at the feet; profuse sweat at the feet; swelling of the sole of the feet; pain at the sole of the feet, when walking; turning over the toes, when walking; cramps in the toes; corns; pain in the corns; dry skin; cracking of the skin; itching when getting warm, in the day-time; itching before going to bed, in the evening; painful eruption on the neck and chest; gnawing itching on the arms and legs; boils and varices of pregnant women; disposition to straining parts, which brings on a painful stiffness of the nape of the neck; twitching in the extremities and the whole body, when sleeping or waking; difficulty of lying on the left side, on account of beating and stinging at the heart; tendency to take cold; after a short walk lassitude of the legs, and burning heat at the sole of the feet; languor; lassitude in the limbs, even in the morning, on waking; frequent yawning, and sleepiness in the lay-time; late falling asleep, in the evening, owing to a crowd of ideas; restless sleep, full of dreams and with frequent waking; frightful dreams; startings during sleep; habitual deficiency of animal heat; flashes of heat; tertian fever with sour vomiting after the chill, and bloating of the face and hands; fever-sweat in the day-time; sweat in the day-time, especially in the face, on taking the least exercise; general emaciation, increasing even to marasmus.
 - Has lycopodium ever cured pulmonary phthisis, as some homoeopathic physicians assert ?
 - I doubt it, but it has often been found wonderfully efficient in chronic pneumonia, with purulent, foul-smelling expectoration, even when one of the lungs, (especially the left,) had become partially hepatised.
 - Under such circumstances, lycopodium acts the more advantageously, the more it is adapted to the constitution and the moral state of the patient.
 - When given to northern men, (especially such as come from England,) tall, of gentle dispositions, but phlegmatic and taciturn, I have seen it produce the best effects in this disease, which had almost always been falsely diagnosed as tuberculous phthisis.
 - I ought to add, that, according to my experience, lycopodium, as well as most other drugs, however, is much more efficacious in the higher than the lower attenuations, and more especially when administered in the form of Jenichen’s preparations, the onethousandth, two-thousandth, three-thousandth, etc., potencies.
 - Camphor, pulsatilla and causticum, have been named by Hahnemann as the antidotes of lycopodium.
 - I am sure that causticum neutralises most of the effects of this drug.
 - The same is true of coffee; but lachesis seems to be the most comprehensive antidote of lycopodium.
 - This, however, depends upon the character of the symptoms that require to be antidoted.