Vol. 21 No. 2 April 2001

In the article by Will Klunker (starting on page 15), the repertorising shows the rubrics, from page 79 of Kent, “SENSITIVE, steel points directed towards her.” A similar rubric, Kent page 44, is “FEAR, of pins.” – both highlight Silica.

Boericke’s Materia Medica has, under Silica “. . . thinks only of pins, fears them, searches and counts them.”

So where does this well-established notion that Silica is a remedy crazy pin-hunting come from? Is it based on such frequent experience that it is worthy of being repeated all over the place?

These questions interested the Canadian homœopath André Saine, and he comments on them in his book, Homœopathy and Psychiatric Patients (Lutra, Netherlands), on page 149.

Fears, searches and counts pins. Have you ever seen a case reported where somebody counts pins? Every materia medica that you read about Silicea repeats the same thing. Counts pins, searches pins and so on.

I tried to look in the literature. I found one case, and it is the case that all materia medica are being written from. Every author repeats the same thing, but I have never seen another case reporting it that way. I will tell you the case.

CASE: woman searching for pins

The case was a woman – and that was reported a long time ago, like 1835. It was a woman that was preparing a cake. She made food for the family and she noticed that there were pins in the kitchen that she couldn’t find afterwards. She had fear that the pins went into the cake that she baked, and she searched the cake to look for the pins and then she couldn’t find them. So she searched all over the rest of the food, she was sure that they were in the food.

That was a cured case with Silicea, and it was reported: “Fixed ideas because thinking of pins.” It was just thinking about the pins being in the food. Then one author after another reports it and reports it, and the reference is always the same reference. The remedy seems to have more and more importance, sometimes it is in bold type. Because I have never seen it reported in a cured case, besides that single case in 1835, I doubt that the symptom is real.