Matthew Wood > Quotes

“Whatever people say they believe in terms of spirituality and religion, what they do when they are sick and in need reflects the true basis of their belief system.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“Calendula was used in German folk medicine as a remedy for wounds and glandular problems.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Let us bring our account to a summation. Burdock acts so widely on the system that it is somewhat difficult to pin down its exact affinities. Yet, we can say that it opens pores and promotes secretion from internal and external surfaces. It seems to act particularly through the liver, lymphatics, and kidneys. It stimulates metabolism through the liver, cleansing and feeding through the lymph, and waste removal through the veins. Thus, it strengthens, wrings out and lifts tissues and organs, including the uterus and prostate. It acts strongly on the skin, to promote or correct perspiration. On the psychological level, Burdock helps us to deal with our worries about the unknown, the “Hedge Ruffians,” the bears, which lurk in the dark woods beyond our control. It seizes upon deep, complex issues, penetrates to the core and brings up old memories and new answers. It gives us the faith to move ahead on our path, despite the unknown problems which may ensnare us along the way. It helps the person who is afraid become more hardy, while it brings the hardy wanderer back to his original path. It restores vigor and momentum. Preparation,”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“We have, seemingly, jumped over the simplest expression of depression. Cold from the environment will reduce cellular activity. The hypothalamus reacts with shivering and fever to return the organism to health. If the organism does not adequately respond, there will be “internal cold” or depression. If it gets stuck in the shivering phase there will be tissue constriction. If it gets stuck in the fever stage there will be tissue irritation. Accordingly, a chill or cold from the environment needs to be treated according to the stage it is moving through or the tissue state where it gets stuck. The”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“The characteristic symptoms of atrophy include a dry tongue. In advanced cases, it may be narrow, thin, withered, or cracked, but it will always be dry. It can also be red from heat caused by a lack of fluids, or pale from lack of nutrition.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“For Paracelsus, the basis of empiricism was the experience that Nature is alive and intelligent. Since this knowledge is subjective, it is hidden. Thus, the individual mineral, plant, or disease has an innate arcanum, intelligence, virtue, power, or energy.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“Magic or “good medicine” is sometimes simply a matter of the proper timing of events, while poor timing can be the source of “bad luck” or “bad medicine.” Someone might say it is “the spirit” acting through our lives. I wouldn’t object to that sentiment. However, I would add a further idea: plants can influence this element of timing. They participate in the life of the spirit just as we do. We should not be so chauvinistic as to believe that we are the only ones on this planet who enjoy that life. Whether we find the right healing remedy or not may be a matter of timing, or being open to the spirit, or believing in the possibility of healing from an unorthodox source, or believing that miracles can happen. Plants, just like any of us, would like to participate in the occurrence of a miracle.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“The characteristic symptoms of atrophy include a dry tongue. In”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“The true physician should have a therapeutic eye, which notices disease whenever it appears, not just when the time clock is running”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Astringents are contracting, but large doses can bind so thoroughly that they cause dryness and tension.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“For Scudder, that which lives senses life. Like Hippocrates, he taught that the study of medicine begins by training the senses to experience life. The human senses are the foundation of medicinal knowledge and they are trained by exposure to life in all its forms.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“(Right angles and switchbacks in the pattern of plant growth are signatures for gall bladder remedies—see Chelidonium as well as Apocynum.)”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“We cannot, however, go wrong with the understanding from biomedicine that there are four levels of organization in the living body: cell, tissue, organ, and system.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“Here are the indications I look for in Sweet Leaf. The stems should be somewhat flexible and soft, as Gilmore remarks. One should be able to feel the volatile oils on the stalk, leaves, and flowers. The taste should be sweet, pungent, peppery, hot, and (most important) “buttery.” There need to be enough volatile oils to cause this “buttery” sensation in the mouth.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Applied externally, it gives “almost instant relief of pain, and rapid healing,” she says. At least in burns of the first and second degree it will prevent vessication, inflammation and scarring.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“The capstone to the entire edifice of herbal medicine is the effective use of herbs, no matter what models we are using to understand the organism.”
― Matthew Wood, The Earthwise Herbal, Volume II: A Complete Guide to New World Medicinal Plants

“every herb and poison ultimately has a primal essence or identity pattern and this, whether delivered in a gentle or a toxic envelope, possesses curative power.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“You know Mars is hot and dry, and you know as well that winter is cold and moist; then you may know as well the reason why nettle-tops, eaten in the spring, consumeth the phlegmatic superfluities in the body of man, that and coldness and moistness of winter hath left behind.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Whenever we have a mental state where there is anger, frustration, and fighting against the flow or a lack of confidence in the natural progression of events, the liver will usually be involved.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“It is easier to study books and “objective facts” than to develop one’s subjective life, senses, perceptive abilities, and method of thinking.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“It is an excellent thing also against Bruises, Cuts or Punctures of the Nerves and Tendons; for it suddenly eases the Pain, and alleviates the Inflammation, and thereby induces the Cure.” (Remember, it contains salicin.) Lady’s Mantle also staunches bleeding, making it “effectual against all sorts of Bleedings both inward and outward,” so that it “stops the Over-flowing of the Terms in Women, and cures the Bloody-flux, as also all other Fluxes of the Bowels.” And it cures “Bruises by Falls or otherwise, whether inwards or outwards.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“excitation/depression, constriction/relaxation, atrophy/torpor.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“Habitat. The environmental niche occupied by a plant reflects stresses and conditions which it has had to adapt to, and these often correspond to conditions in the organism. Plants which grow in wet situations often relate to organ systems which handle dampness in the body, such as the lymphatics and kidneys. They correspond to diseases produced by an excess of dampness—respiratory problems, mucus, lymphatic stagnation, swollen glands, kidney and bladder problems, intermittent fever and rheumatic complaints (rheuma = dampness in Greek). Here we think of Horsetail (low, wet sands/kidneys), Eryngo (salty, sandy seashores/kidneys), Gravel Root (swamps/kidneys), Swamp Milkweed (swamps/kidneys), Hydrangea (sides of streams/kidneys), Boneset (wet soils/joints and fever), Willow (low ground/joints and fever), Meadowsweet (low ground/rheumatic pains, intermittent fever), Northern White Cedar (cedar swamps and margins of lakes/lymphatics), Labrador Tea (cedar swamps and margins of lakes/lymphatics), various Knotweeds (low ground/kidneys), Sweet Flag (swamps/mucus, lungs and joints), Angelica (damp, shady, cool valleys/damp, cold rheumatic and respiratory conditions).”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Herbs can be used for either material or energetic purposes, to suppress or cure.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“Cells in the body form into tissues, of which there are four basic kinds: muscular, nervous, epithelial, and connective.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“It only not calms and tones the nerves, but it acts very deeply to restore and improve the nerves of sense and thought.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Pungent, spicy herbs stimulate a response through the nasal scent glands that mimics a taste reaction. True acridity, on the other hand, is the sensation caused by bile in the back of the throat. It is the only completely unpleasant taste.”
― Matthew Wood, The Earthwise Herbal, Volume II: A Complete Guide to New World Medicinal Plants

“(Rash, boils, profuse sweating, and lack of sweat are usually good indications of clogging in the lymphatic glands.)”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines

“Action and reaction generates the six tissue states.”
― Matthew Wood, The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification

“The five phases are associated with the five basic flavors received by the human tongue: bitter (fire), sweet (earth), pungent or acrid (metal), salty (water), and sour (wind). Although the flavors fit the elements neatly, they function very pragmatically, as guides for knowledge about herbal properties.”
― Matthew Wood, The Book of Herbal Wisdom: Using Plants as Medicines