Carbo vegetabilis appears in 12 of the 13 classic books on Similia. Each was written to do a different job — here is what each adds on this remedy, with the opening of its entry.
- 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 — The raw proving record — symptoms as the provers reported them, unedited.
“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 (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 /…”
- 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…”
- Kent — The mental and general picture — who the patient is, before what the remedy cures.
“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 (KN) — Only the symptoms Lippe considered reliable enough to prescribe on.
“Burning pain in exterior parts, in ulcers and in bones. Pressing sensation in inner parts. Paralytic tearing in the limbs with flatulency In the morning, when rising from the bed, the limbs feel as though broken. Bad effects from the loss of fluids. Great debility much worse from the smallest exertion of body or mind…”
- 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…”
