Aphorism 35:
The Evidence of Failure: Aphorism 35 and the Proof of Dissimilarity
In Aphorism 35, Samuel Hahnemann sets the stage to prove the “homoeopathic therapeutic law” by looking at its opposite: the failure of dissimilarity. Having established that similarity is required for a cure, he now examines why treatments and natural events that lack this similarity—the allopathic or unhomoeopathic approach—can never result in true healing.
The Purpose of the Aphorism
Aphorism 35 serves as a scientific bridge. Hahnemann intends to illustrate the “correctness” of the Law of Similars by providing clear, observable evidence from two main areas:
- Nature: What happens when two dissimilar natural diseases meet in the same person.
- Medicine: The results of ordinary allopathic treatment using drugs that cannot produce symptoms similar to the disease.
Nature’s Inability to Cure by Dissimilarity
Hahnemann asserts that “even Nature herself” is unable to remove a disease already present in the body by introducing a new one that is dissimilar, no matter how much stronger that new disease might be. This observation is critical because it shows that the failure of allopathic medicine is not just a human error but is rooted in a fundamental law of nature. If nature cannot cure through dissimilarity, then a physician cannot hope to do so with “unsuitable allopathic drugs”.
The Allopathic Parallel
This aphorism explicitly links allopathic practice to these natural failures. Hahnemann argues that the unhomoeopathic employment of even the “strongest medicines” is incapable of curing any disease whatsoever because these medicines are “incapable of producing an artificial morbid condition similar to the disease to be cured”.
Instead of a cure, these dissimilar influences lead to one of three outcomes (which he details in the following aphorisms):
- Repulsion: The old disease keeps the new one away.
- Suspension: The new, stronger disease suppresses the old one only as long as it lasts.
- Complication: The two dissimilar diseases join together to form a complex, “double” disease.
Conclusion: A Science of Relational Logic
Aphorism 35 reinforces that the physician’s art must be an imitation of Nature’s successful operations, not its failures. By showing that dissimilarity—whether natural or medicinal—leads only to suppression or complication, Hahnemann clears the path for the only remaining truth: that similarity is the indispensable requirement for a radical and permanent cure.
