Bufo Rana

In spite of modern scepticism regarding the poisonous properties of the toad,

Shakspere, who seems to have known everything, was absolutely correct in speaking of the toad

as having "sweltered venom." The poison is excreted by glands in the skin of the back. L.

• ▸Guthrie (H.
• ▸W.
• ▸, xxviii.
• ▸484) tells a story of an Italian peasant, apparently dying of dropsy, whose

wife, weary of the interminable length of his illness, thought to hasten his end by putting a toad

into his wine. The result was the man was completely cured. "Quintessence of toads" figured

largely in the therapy of Salmon's Doron Medicon (1583), where it is commended as a

"Specifick in the Dropsy." Homceopathic experiments and poisonings have shown that this

reputation is founded on fact. But the chief laurels of Bufo have been won in the treatment of

epilepsy. Bojanus has cured many cases; and no medicine has served me better in the treatment

of this disease. Few people who have witnessed a characteristic epileptic seizure can have failed

to notice the curiously toad-like aspect assumed by the subject. The epileptic seizure and the

status-epilepticus give the clearest correspondence to the Bufo range of action. Again, epilepsy is

often found among the effects of self-abuse in the young, and Bufo provokes the tendency to the

practice, and even causes impotence. The Indian women of Brazil are aware of this last property,

and administer the venom to their husbands in food or drink when they wish to free themselves

from their marital attentions. Bufo causes low grades of inflammatory action, fetid exhalations

and discharges. (I have removed the fetor in hopeless cases of cancer with this remedy.)

Guernsey commends it in panaritium where the pain runs in streaks, all the way up the arm. Also

when the fingers have been injured and look black, with pains running in streaks up the arm. E.

E. Case has reported a cure with Bufo cinereus of "epistaxis daily for several weeks with flushed

face, heat and pain in forehead > by the bleeding; there was also easy perspiration in general, apt

to be offensive, especially on the feet." According to Lippe Bufo is especially indicated in

epilepsy when the attacks occur during sleep at night. The patient may or may not be awakened

by the attack; if not, when he does awaken he will have violent headache. Epileptic symptoms

are < in warm room; but there is also great sensitiveness to cold air and wind. Marked

periodicity: quartan fevers. Heemorrhages.

• ▸Anxious about health.
• ▸Sad, restless.
• ▸Propensity to bite.
• ▸Howling; impatient; nervous; imbecile.
• ▸Desire for solitude. Feeble-minded.

Epileptic attacks, ushered in by a cry; face livid followed by sleep; occur at

midnight; at time of menses; at change of moon; result of sexual excitement.—Swelling of whole

body which turns a deep yellow.—Lividity.

• ▸Sensation as if hot vapor rose to top of head.
• ▸Numbness of brain.
• ▸Face bathed in sweat.
• ▸Epistaxis with flushed face and pain in forehead, better, nosebleed.

Numbness of brain before attack.—Pressure like two iron hands holding

temples.—Headache: after breakfast; one-sided (r.) > by nose-bleed; congestive; < by light and

• ▸noise; with cold feet and palpitation.
• ▸—Head at first drawn to one side (r.
• ▸or 1.
• ▸), then backwards

before an attack.—Sensation as if hot vapour rose to top of head.

Cannot bear sight or brilliant objects. Little blisters form on eye.

• ▸R.
• ▸eye open, |.
• ▸nearly closed; eyeballs rolled upward and to |.
• ▸before attack.
• ▸—L.
• ▸lid

paralysed.

Music is unbearable (Ambra). Every little noise distresses.

Least noise disagreeable; music intolerable.—Purulent otorrhoea; ulceration and

bleeding of external ears.

Face bloated and distorted; mouth and eyes convulsed.—Hot flushes.—Face bathed in

sweat (during spasms).

Paralysis of tongue; lapping motion before attacks.—Stuttering and stammering;

angry when not understood.—Bloody saliva; fetid breath —Desire for sweet drinks.

• ▸Menses too early and copious, clots and bloody discharge at other times; watery leucorrhoea.
• ▸Excitement, with epileptic attacks.
• ▸Epilepsy at time of menses.
• ▸Induration in mammary glands.
• ▸Palliative in cancer of the mammae.
• ▸Burning in ovaries and uterus.
• ▸Ulceration of cervix.
• ▸Offensive bloody discharge.
• ▸Pains run into legs.
• ▸Bloody milk.
• ▸Milk-leg.
• ▸Veins swollen.
• ▸Tumors and polypi of womb.

Menses too early and too profuse; epileptic attacks with

• ▸menses.
• ▸—Headache with or before menses.
• ▸—Cancer of breast.
• ▸—Cord-like swelling from groin to

knee (milk-leg).

• ▸17, 19.
• ▸Respiratory Organs and Heart.
• ▸—Bumning like fire in lungs.
• ▸—Heart feels as if too large;

as if drowned in a basin of water —Palpitation with headache; during menses.—Constriction

about heart.

• ▸Involuntary emissions; impotence, discharge too quick, spasms during coition.
• ▸Buboes.
• ▸Disposition to handle organs (Hyos; Zinc).
• ▸Effects of onanism.

• ▸Feels too large.
• ▸Palpitation.
• ▸Constriction about heart.
• ▸Sensation of heart swimming in water.

Attacks ushered in by a jerk in nape of neck.—Swelling of bone size of fist

(caries of dorsal vertebra).

Great desire to exercise the arms.—Burning lancinating in bones —Arms

• ▸become stiffened before an attack—Numbness of 1.
• ▸arm.
• ▸—Arms go to sleep easily.
• ▸—Blister in

hand recurring annually.—After slight contusion inflammation of lymphatics.—Panaritium,

swelling blue-black around nail; pain in streaks up arm.—Contraction of fingers of r. hand, then

1., followed by lapping movement of tongue with thumbs drawn into pelvis; before an attack

(epilepsy).

Sciatica.—Lower limbs more in motion than upper.—Cramp awakens him

from sleep.—Lower limbs get weak (brain-softening).—Lower limbs straight and stiff before

attack.—Swelling of knees with pulsative and distending pains.—Podagra.

Pains in loins, numbness of limbs, cramps, staggering gait, feeling as if a peg were driven in joints; swelling of bones.

• ▸Panaritium; pain runs up arm.
• ▸Patches of skin lose sensation.
• ▸Pustules, suppuration from every slight injury.
• ▸Pemphigus.
• ▸Bullae which open and leave a raw surface, exuding and ichorous fluid.
• ▸Blisters on palms and soles.
• ▸Itching and burning.
• ▸Carbuncle.

Dirty greenish oily.—Large yellow bullz, which open, leaving a raw surface exuding

• ▸an ichorous fluid.
• ▸—Burning blisters.
• ▸—Sweat profuse; oily —Carbuncles.
• ▸—Chilblains.

• ▸Brain, softening of.
• ▸Buboes.
• ▸Cancer.
• ▸Carbuncles.
• ▸Caries.
• ▸Chorea.
• ▸Dropsy.
• ▸Epilepsy.

• ▸Heart, affections of.
• ▸Impotence.
• ▸Intermittents.
• ▸Malignant pustule.
• ▸Meningitis.
• ▸Panarititum.

• ▸Pemphigus.
• ▸Phlegmasia alba dolens.
• ▸Plague.
• ▸Podagra.
• ▸Self-abuse.
• ▸Skin, affections of.

Stammering. Suppuration. Whitlow.

Heloderma, Amphisboena. Salamandra is complementary in epilepsy and brain-

• ▸softening (Hering).
• ▸Antidoted by: Lach.
• ▸, Seneg.
• ▸Similar: Cubeb.
• ▸In convulsions from low grades

• ▸of suppuration, Arsen.
• ▸, Canth.
• ▸, Lach.
• ▸, and Tarent.
• ▸; in epilepsy aura starting in solar plexus,

• ▸Artem.
• ▸, Calc.
• ▸, Nux, Sil.
• ▸; aura starting in arm, Lach.
• ▸, Sul.
• ▸; in chorea, patient cannot walk, must

• ▸run or jump, Kali bro.
• ▸, Nat.
• ▸m.
• ▸; as if heart in water, Bovist.
• ▸; in masturbation, impotence, &c.
• ▸,

• ▸Hyo.
• ▸, Merc.
• ▸, Sul.
• ▸; in malignant pustule, Anthrax.
• ▸, Ant.
• ▸c.
• ▸, Lach.
• ▸in bulla, panaritium, &c.
• ▸, Hep.
• ▸,

• ▸Lach.
• ▸, Ph.
• ▸ac.
• ▸, Sil.
• ▸, Diosc.
• ▸Head drawn to either side, Camph.

Compare: Baryt carb; Asterias; Salamand (Epilepsy and softening of brain).

Antidotes: Laches; Seneg.

Complementary: Salamandra.

Sixth potency and higher.

satyhicnis is the one 1 use in practice. Bufo is a wonderful medicine, it profoundly affects the mind and especially the intellectual

faculties, including (unfusion of mind and loss of memory until the

patient gradually goes towards a state of imbecility. The greatest

use of this medicine will be found in nervous conditions, throbbings,

jerking and spasmodic condition of muscles, ulceration of the skin

and mucous membranes, and all this in such patients as are tending

towards a state of imbecility, a state of confusion or weakness of

mind. The imbecility is more frequent in Bufo than the active

states of insanity or mania, yet these appear occasionally through

the remedy.

The first symptom in the text reads, “Desire for solitude in order

to practice masturbation." This alone throws a flood of light upon

the nature of the remedy ; the lack of government, the lack of control over the sexual longing, and the low-mindedness whereby he is

willing to abandon himself to the lower things that are in the human

• ▸race, to perverted practices and vices.
• ▸It tells a great story.
• ▸“Whimpered, then cried, until he fell into a state of coma.
• ▸" These states,

^53

' as brought out clinically, are manifested in adult people who act as if

they were children. An aspect of child-like simplicity is present and

the mind returns to a state of child-like innocence. An adult takes

on the w^ays of a child, as a state of imbecility. This mental state is

especially found under Baryta carb. in adults who have never developed beyond childhood, who have always remained children. A

person reasons like a child, talks like a child, whimpers like a child,

cries like a child, wants to be petted like a child ; so it is in Baryta

carb. We find this state of mind in children who have developed

epilepsy, but we do not prescribe this remedy on account of the epilepsy ; the child has not developed properly, and the epilepsy is only

one of the manifestations. The cause is far back, and is really the

psoric condition. Thereby the mental state has not developed, the

child has not grown into a man or woman in intellectual attainments or wisdom, and remains as a whimpering, screaming child.

This lack of development is found in Bufo and in Baryta carh. ; they

are related to each other in that the child-like state remains while

the body grows. Wc see in these medicines the fear and simplicity

that belongs to the child ; always sickly, deficient, never reaching

adult fulness or growth, always a child. “How much like a child

that woman appears, or ‘How much like a child that man is.‘‘ Wc

say that of some old people, they are so childish. Ihe old routinists

have said of those people who arc prematurely old or have taken on

senility, that they need Baryta curb. This medicine also stands out in

bold type for those prematurely senile ; the man at fifty acts like an

old broken-down man of eighty ; he has lost all he had live or six

years ago, and has taken on a child-likc simplicity and innocence, an

appearance of imbecility. Then it is that we think of this medicine.

Baryta curb, has hitherto been the leading one, but Bufo is also very

important. '*Lefi his bed after apathy and ran like mad through the

house.’' There it branches olt from the condition of imbecility to

that of excitement of mind. Most of the Bufo patients will be

passive, placid, not in a state of excitement or mania, but passive in

everything. Feeble-minded, simple, child-like. “Weak memory and

idiotic.'' “Longs for solitude, yet dreads being alone." “Angry, bites

at surrounding objects." “Easily laughs or cries." It has been

used in delirium tremens, during the stages of excitement and mental

prostration, biting and grasping things. “Titters," now that is more

expressive than to say she laughs, she titters at every little thing that

is said. Titters and says foolish things ; titters over things that are

not laughable; everything said seems to be funny to this simple,

child-like woman. You know a child laughs and is merry, but we

do not expect such things in adults except when what is said is

particularly ludicrous. These symptoms are sometimes met in epilep-

^54

tics. “Easily laughs or cries easily affected, and extremely sensitive,

nervous nature. Again, the most extreme anxiety, night and day,

wringing the hands and talking about something awful that is going

to happen wdien there is nothing to happen ; some awful event, some

terrible thing in the future, it is all darkness and despair, walks the

floor and wrings the hands and says over and over the same awful

things that are going to take place, when in reality the future is safe

and there is nothing to be anxious about. This occurs in cases of

insanity. Such as are approaching imbecility are passive, they have a

lack of comprehension of things around ; but those that are going into

insanity have an increased imagination of the things that surround

them. Where these symptoms have been induced by secret vice.

“Become angry if misunderstood.’' This is approaching insanity.

It is well known to medical men and to the courts that these conditions of insanity intermingle in the human race with epilepsy, and.

that an epileptic is not always held responsible for murder, because

it is so well known that the epileptic state of the body is not confined merely to the spasms of the muscles, the sudden falling, foaming

at the mouth, clonic spasms, biting of the tongue, etc. These alone

do not constitute all of epilepsy. The epileptic suffers from an underlying psoric state, which in one is a state of imbecility and in another

a state of epileptic manifestation, and in another a state of insanity.

Those who inherit this peculiar constitution, even in one family, exhibit it in different ways ; one will be insane, another an imbecile,

another will die of cancer and another will be an epileptic. Bufo*

underlies such a constitution ; it is an antipsoric, it is a deep-seated,

vital remedy ; it goes to the very heart and interior of man's physical

nature, and from this mental state it may manifest itself in his ultimates, the fingers and toes, eyes, ears, etc., so that even the touch is

disordered. There are patches upon the skin that have loss of sensation and others with increased sensations. Spasms of various

muscles, sometimes local spasm and sometimes complete epileptic

spasms with bleeding at the mouth, unconsciousness, falling down.

Besides such grave state, it has milder states that may be called mere

dizziness or vertigo. The milder conditions of dizziness have gone

on to sudden falling and collapse, a sudden state of unconsciousness

with spasms and biting of the tongue. In the proving we find attacks of apathy and partial coma ; numbness of the brain. So we see

in the text that we have conditions ranging from mere dizziness to

a complete and profound epilepsy. The study of this remedy may reveal to you something of the nature of epilepsy. From the allopathic

treatises on epilepsy you will only get the appearance of the fit, and

the fit is treated as epilepsy. They hunt for remedies to subdue and

control the fit, thinking when they have done that they have cured

the patient. They feed these patients Bromides in large doses and

now and then they branch off into some side issue, but go back to

the Bromides and stupefy and make imbeciles of their patients. Prescribing for the fit has never cured the patient.

''Congestive headaches.” Again, its action on the circular fibres

of the abdominal aorta furnishes a key-note in epilepsy. An awful

sensation of anxiety is felt in the abdomen and then there is a

sudden loss of consciousness ; the aura or warning is first felt in the

abdomen. Some writers have described it as in the solar plexus.

The awful sensation occurs as an anxiety and then he falls.

'"Cannot bear the sight of briliant objects.” “Amaurosis,” etc.

“Pupils largely dilated and unaffected by light before attack.” "More

acute vision,”

It has spasmodic conditions of the eye, but increased vision and

diminished sensation, and lastly a tendency to profound trophic disturbance. Little blisters form upon the eye. These little blisters also

form upon the skin, and the integument is thrown off and there is.

no healing. Ulcers wdll form upon the cornea. "Eyes become highly

injected.” Paralytic conditions of the lids and muscles of the eye.

There is disturbance of all the senses. "Music is unbearable.” One

who is in a natural state is expected to enjoy beautiful music, whereas

in this remedy music brings about a state of anxiety. The sense

of hearing is so violently exaggerated that every little noise is distressing. "Purulent otorrhoea.^^ "Swelling of the ears ; of the

parotids.” "Phlegmonous ery^p^las about the face.” "Falling out

of the teeth* in the peculiar disease knowm as Rigg’s disease.

"Stuttering and stammering ; gets angry when incoherent speech

is not understood.” "Biting the tongue.” "l^ongue cracked, bluish

black.’ "Mouth wide open before an attack,* showing that the

spasm is coming on ; and this condition increases so that when the

attack is not on, he drops the jaw and looks stupid as if he had forgotten everything. Bufo often corresponds to lesser attacks resembling vertigo. In this state people do not fall, and for a few

«^econds everything is blank, or sometimes they do things automatically in these moments. A person, in this mild form of epileptic

vertigo, will hardly show anything, but he will sometimes come to

a perfect standstill and then go on as if nothing had happened. What

occurred during that attack he knows nothing of. Sometimes he

will continue right on doing what he was doing, and nobody will

know of the spell. Sometimes when driving he will turn his horses

around, and when he comes to himself he will know by this that he

has had one of his attacks. Quite a number of medicines have produced that condition of the mind, a ^tate in which he goes on doing

things automatically.

‘‘Vomiting after drinking/' “Yellow fluid in vomit. “Vomiting of bile or blood.’* “Spasms end by convulsive movements in abdomen.” It says in the text, “The attack originates in abdomen

that is, he has a feeling of anxiety in the abdomen previous to the

attack.

“Haemorrhoidal tumors.” “Urine passes involuntarily." The

urine passes involuntarily in such as are becoming imbeciles from

the epileptic attacks, in approaching softening of the brain, which is

really w^hat is taking place, a form of softening, a lowered form of

integrity.

As you might suppose, there is great disturbance of the sexual

organs, this is usually the case in insane people. Sometimes the

sexual organs are in a state of excitement and sometimes in a stated

of impotency, but the patient is low-minded, inclination to carry

the hand constantly to the genital organs. “Semen is discharged too

quickly without pleasurable sensation.” Spasms or epilepsy comes on

during coition. It has also inflammation of glands, especially about

the groins, such as are found in syphilis.

In the female sexual organs burning is the most striking feature ;

burning in the ovaries and uterus. It is one of the most troublesome

symptoms you will have to contend with, when a case of dysmenorrhoea has burning in the ovaries and in the pelvis, at the coming on

of or during menses. Burning in the genital organs, in the ovaries,

and rending, tearing pains that extend down the thighs. This

forms a troublesome kind of dysmenorrhoea, especially when there

arc cysts and hydatids al)out the ovaries. Some will tell you that

these cannot be cured. All these conditions arc curable ! “Burning

heat and stitches in ovaries.” “Distending, burning pains or cramps

in uterus.” This remedy has been a great palliative for these awful

burning pains that occur in carcinoma of the uterus ; stitching, rending, tearing pains in carcinoma of the uterus, when the pains run outwards into the legs, with ulceration of the uterus and cervix ; tearing,

stinging pains and bloody, offensive leucorrhcca. Bufo is full of offensive discharges ; bloody, offensive Icucorrhoca. You would think

you had the odor of gangrene or gangrenous erysipelas in the room

from smelling these discharges. “Enormous blisters upon tumefied

uterus, discharging a thin,, serous, yellow fluid.” This occurs in

epileptic states.

“Menstruation suppressed,” “too early with headache,” “burning in

uterus and vagina.” “Spasms occur just before menses.” That is, girls

who are subject to epilepsy have increase of spasm at the time of

menses, sometimes before, sometimes during. “Attacks worse at time

of menses.” “During menses contractive pain in liver.” “Yellow fluid

leucorrhoea.” When the girl lies in an unconscious condition during

the menstrual period and has several epileptic spasms which she has

no realization of until told and then she is too much dazed to understand it she needs Bufo.

Bufo has been a great palliative in cancer of the mammae, for the

burning pains and for the blisters that form roundabout ; large, yellow

blisters ; blisters that fill with yellow, serous discharge ; it has been

especially useful when the milk is mixed with blood. It corresponds

to the low form of inflammation of the blood vessels, like milk leg,

when the veins feel like whipcords in the thighs.

‘‘Burning, excoriation in larynx.” You see how burning runs all

through the remedy; it occurs w^heiever there are inflammatory conditions or where nerves are sensitive and painful, and the nerve sheath

becomes painful and sensitive to touch along its course ; hence its

use in sciatica and other inflammatory conditions of large nerves.

• ▸“Violent cough with vomiting.
• ▸” Cough with gJtgging and retching.
• ▸Expectoration is bloody or formed of pure blood.
• ▸Sensation

of coldness in chest. “Burning like fire in lungs.” Burning extending

up into the larynx ; gangrene of the lungs. “Laryngitis, haemoptysis.”

Burning in the chest with all these affections, such as have been described. It has the phthisical constitution when the epilepsy has been

turned aside by strong drugs. It has the phthisical constitution when

discharges have been suppressed by closing fistulous openings, or by

stimulating ointments. It has those low forms of disease which must

develop when outward manifcfiftations have been suppressed. The

constitution that belongs to th^ very nature of the individual will

come out in epilepsy, in insanit^y in imbecility, in cancer, in some one

of the low forms of disease. This medicine corrcwsponds to a low

type and constitution. The nature of the Bufo constitution is such

that it is capable of giving out symptoms similar to those produced

by low forms of disease. He is not likely to live to be old, he is likely

to break down at forty. She comes to her end by cancer of uterus or

breast, or by imbecility. He comes to his end with low forms of

disease, malignant manifestations. This medicine, therefore, goes

into the very life. Children develop an unusual tendency to low*

forms of chronic disease ; they do not possess a good healthy nature,

a good sound brain ; but they are feeble, they break out with eruptions, they go into consumption. Persons of twenty-five have a tendency to break down, and when the symptams look like those of Bufo

this medicine will, in a wonderful way, make that constitution all

over. Such cases as these only get wdl by a violent turmoil and by

tremendous aggravations. When wc approach these diseases by easy

stages the patient does not get so much disorder dr excitement, bur

is not cured so radically. Old diseases would re-appear, old gonorrhoeas would be brought back, and old syphilitic states come up,

Bruised pains; trembling; cramps; arthritic swellings.—Swelling of hands and arms;

burning pains.