- Allen HC — The keynotes that separate this remedy from its nearest neighbours.
“Vegetable Charcoal For the bad effects of exhausting diseases, whether in young or old (Cinch., Phos., Psor.); cachetic persons whose vitality has become weakened or exhausted. Persons who have never fully recovered from the exhausting effects of some previous illness; asthma dates from measles or pertusis of…”
- Allen TF — A compiled symptom record drawing on proving reports and other named observations.
“Preparation . Triturations of any well-prepared charcoal (Hahnemann used charcoal from birch for his own provings; some of the other provings were made with charcoal from the red beech). Authorities. Emotional. Very much excited in the evening, with distended veins, 1. Immoderately jovial, though easily put out of…”
- Boericke — The quick clinical read — keynotes, modalities and the conditions it is actually prescribed in.
“Vegetable Charcoal Disintegration and imperfect oxidation is the keynote of this remedy. The typical Carbo patient is sluggish, fat and lazy and has a tendency to chronicity in his complaints. Blood seems to stagnate in the capillaries, causing blueness, coldness, and ecchymosis. Body becomes blue, icy-cold. Bacteria…”
- Boger (GA) — Which general headings this remedy belongs under — the analytical scaffolding.
“ACHING AIR Open, Amel.:- IN ROOM, agg., air hunger, etc. BLACK, dark, etc. BLOOD SEPSIS, etc. BLOOD VESSELS. BLUISH, purple, livid, etc. BROWNISH, rusty, etc. CHEST, backward in CHEST, right CLOTHES, pressure of, Agg. COLDNESS, Partial COLLAPSE, sudden prostration, etc. COMPRESSION, squeezing, pinching, as of a vise…”
- Boger (Syn) — Generals and modalities in a short analytical portrait rather than a symptom list.
“MUCOUS MEMBRANES: DIGESTIVE TRACT. STOMACH. HEART: VENOUS CIRCULATION. Blood. Occiput. WARMTH. DEPLETIONS. Cooling off. EXHAUSTING DISEASES. Old age. HIGH LIVING. Rich foods. DISSIPATION. Overlifting. Walking in open air. Pressure of clothes. Weather: Extreme temperatures. Cold night air; frosty; humid. Air. Wind on…”
- Clarke — The widest entry — sources, provings, clinical uses, relationships and antidotes in one place.
“Vegetable Charcoal. C (impure). Trituration. Acidity / Acne / Angina Pectoris / Aortitis / Aphonia / Asthenopia / Asthma / Breasts, erysipelas of / Bronchitis / Burns / Carbuncle / Catarrh / Chilblains / Cholera / Constipation / Cough / Deafness / Debility / Diarrhœa / Distension / Dysentery / Dyspepsia / Emphysema /…”
- Dunham — The method — how symptoms are weighed before a remedy is differentiated.
“CARBO LIGNI. VEGETABLE CHARCOAL. CHARCOAL possesses the power of absorbing gases in large quantities in vastly greater proportions than the relation of its bulk. It condenses the gases within its pores. It does not act equally upon all gases in this way; absorbs but little hydrogen; more oxygen; large quantities of…”
- Farrington — The differential diagnosis — remedy families narrowed through direct clinical comparison.
“THE CARBON GROUP. Carbo animalis (contains phosphate of lime). Carbo vegetabilis (contains carbonate of potash). Graphites (contains iron). Aniline sulphate. Carboneum (Lampblack). Coal gas. Bisulphide of Carbon. I invite your attention this morning to the medicines obtained from the carbon group. Carbon in its purity…”
- Guernsey — The leading characteristics — a compact bridge from repertory result to remedy study.
“This remedy very often proves of great use at a late stage of typhus fever, or cholera, where the patient is in a state of collapse, and is almost gone; wants to be fanned, wants the windows open, his head is hot, etc. Also troubles resulting from some other disease, as in complaints caused from the checking of chills…”
- Hahnemann (CD) — The antipsoric proving record — Hahnemann's later materia medica in its chronic-disease setting.
“WOOD CHARCOAL. The charcoal of any kind of wood, thoroughly heated to redness, seems to manifested itself uniformly in its effects on the human health, when it has been prepared and potentized in the manner which Homœopathy uses. I employ the charcoal of birch wood ; in some of the provings by others the charcoal of…”
- Hahnemann (MMP) — The proving record — numbered observations closest to Hahnemann's primary materia medica.
“(Wood-Charcoal.) From vol. vi, 2nd edit., 1827. (The charcoal of any kind of wood, thoroughly heated to redness, manifests a uniformity in its effects on the human health, after adequate disengagement and development (potentization) of its innate medicinal spirit by trituration with a non-medicinal substance (e.g…”
- Hering — Graded symptoms, each weighted by how often provers and practice confirmed it.
“Vegetable charcoal. Lowitz, a German, discovered the properties of vegetable charcoal to deodorize and arrest putrefaction. It was first employed in medicine with success, externally, to fetid ulcers and eruptions, afterwards internally for flatulences, its employment all the while being based upon its chemical…”
- Hughes & Dake — The source evidence — provings and poisonings retained with their experimental context.
“Carbo vegetabilis. Vegetable charcoal made from the wood of the birch, beech, or any other tree. I. Provings.- 1. HAHNEMANN, Mat. Med. Pura, vol. vi of original (2nd ed.), vol. i of translation. Contains 720 symptoms from self and 3 fellow-provers . 2. IBID., Chronic Diseases, Part iii of original, vol. of…”
- Kent — The mental and general picture — how Kent organizes the remedy’s historical symptom portrait.
“We will take up the study of Vegetable Charcoal - Carbo veg. It is a comparatively inert substance made medicinal and powerful, and converted into a great healing agent, by grinding it fine enough. By dividing it sufficiently, it becomes similar to the nature of sickness and cures folks. The Old School use it in…”
- Lippe (MM) — The strict Hahnemannian reading — the symptom picture without clinical interpretation.
“Restlessness and anxiety (in the evening, 4-6 P.M.). Periodical weakness of the memory. Sensitiveness and irritability. Giddiness when moving the head. Congestions to the head. Pressing headache, with tears in the eyes; they are painful when moving them; the hairy scalp is painful to the touch; worse in the afternoon…”
- Lippe (Red) — Keynotes with the most-trusted ones marked as red-line symptoms.
“Common name: vegetable charcoal. Especially adapted to adynamic diseases with great prostration (Ars.) (Bt.). Low, grave, depraved or cachectic state (Ars., Chin., Phos., Sec.) (B.). Inflammation of parotid gland (parotitis); with metastasis to the testes (Ars., Jab., Nat-M., Puls., Rhus-T.; with metastasis to the…”
- Nash — The comparisons — the remedy set beside the ones it is most often confused with.
“Vital force nearly exhausted; complete collapse. Blood stagnates in the capillaries; venous turgescence; surface cold and blue. Hemorrhages (nose, stomach, gums, bowels, bladder or any mucous surface), with indescribable paleness of the surface of the body. Mucous membranes break down, become spongy, bleed, ulcerate…”