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.Through all this the ego is brought into an especially lively activity.This lively activity of the ego — this driving force of the ego — can be noticed first in the urine activity, where a purgative, diuretic effect appears.These are outward expressions of ego activity.We can find the conditions treatable by this remedy if we simply ask, “What is the human organism suffering from when these things are not in order?” The answer is dropsy and similar conditions.In decoctions of iris root we therefore have something with which we should try to combat dropsy and similar edematous conditions.In taking a step upward in our study of the plants, let us consider the green leafy parts of the plant.We will take a characteristic plant like marjoram (majorana origanum).We must realize, when we come to the leaf, that nature herself completes certain processes that we must first carry to completion in the roots.When we take the leaf therefore, it is not good to prepare a decoction directly.We need the finer forces of the leaf and can obtain these by preparing an infusion.The forces that we really need are made available through preparing the leaf in an infusion.Here again you can grasp what we are dealing with by means of the senses.The infusion of marjoram has the peculiar flavor that might be called the “warming” flavor.At the same time, it has a certain bitterness.Then you have the aromatic smell, the ethereal oil, that proves so clearly that here something is working outward.In addition, you have something that need only be added to intensify all this, but whose physical effect does not manifest as early as other products.This aspect does not appear in its physical effect until it has passed through the stomach and has reached the intestines.These are the various kinds of salts present in the leaf, especially in marjoram.You may therefore say that this leaf-infusion has a particularly strong effect on the breathing activity of the inner organs: it calls forth a certain breathing activity in the inner organs.This finds expression in the sweat-provoking effect of this infusion, i.e., the inner organic activity in the form of breathing is stimulated.It has a diaphoretic effect, and the reaction therefore strengthens the activity of the inner organs.With infusions of marjoram leaves, one can work on the one hand against upper respiratory congestions, rhinitis, etc.and on the other hand against uterine weaknesses.All this will become clearer when we move on to the effect of blossoms.Let us look at this effect in an instance where the plant shows it with special clearness, for example, where many small blossoms are clustered together in an inflorescence, as in the elder (sambucus nigra) or lilac.Let us be quite clear that here the plant is penetrated by precisely those forces that have a great deal to do with the environment of the earth, that contain cosmic influences, cosmic radiations.From this we note that elder flowers also contain ethereal oils.We notice it particularly from the fact that these flowers contain sulfur.In these flowers we therefore have something from the mineral kingdom that proves especially effective if we wish to stimulate breathing, but now from the other side: to stimulate the actual breathing organization, whereas earlier we spoke of stimulating breathing in the digestive organs and organs near them, before the breathing of the actual respiratory organs intervened.When we use elder flowers in the form of an infusion we stimulate particularly the etheric activity of the human organism, and only by way of this etheric activity do we stimulate the activity of the astral body.It is especially the breathing in the upper, posterior organs that is stimulated, not so much the head organs as those belonging to the actual respiration.Of course, reactions such as purging and sweating naturally appear everywhere.Now, however, the organs of breathing are stimulated.The normal breathing activity is intensified and — because this has to have an effect on the blood — the blood circulation is stimulated from inside the human being.We can immediately conclude from these observations that it is possible to work against catarrhs by such means, and also inhibited sweat-formation, hoarseness, and coughing.And, because the effect that before appeared directly, now appears polarically, we can also use this remedy in rheumatic conditions.It is always a question of determining what curative forces a remedy may contain from the way it acts.Let us now consider situations in which it may be necessary to act especially upon the head organization.What is it that really depends on the head organization? Digestion, its polar opposite, depends on it.Indeed, the cruder digestive processes, the cause of so many serious illnesses, depend on the head organization.Hence we must realize that we can influence the head through the cruder digestive processes
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