Herbal Tonic Therapies      
Daniel B. Mowrey, Ph.D.

Tonics Are A Great Paradox      

October - 2002
     If you are reading this column, chances are good that you already possess a general understanding of the notion of tonics. If you are new to the subject, or even if you are not new to tonics, my wish is that I may be able to use this medium to share with you some of the things I have learned about tonics during the years I have spent in their study. Some years ago I wrote a book called Herbal Tonic Therapies in the introduction to which I wrote, "The main purpose of this book is to introduce, or reintroduce, to the American public the concept of a ‘tonic.’ I believe that very few Americans really know what a tonic is, and even fewer understand what role tonics can play in health." In this month’s initial installment on tonics, I would like to make a few observations about that passage. First of all, I think the passage is as true today as it was then. Americans, unlike cultures with a few centuries of history behind them, have all but lost whatever knowledge of natural medicine they might have once possessed. We are the people of the future. We are the biggest, baddest, most sophisticated civilization to ever populate a continent. We got here by pioneering the future and we don’t look back. Unfortunately, in leaving the past behind, we often loose sight of some things that would serve us well in any age. Like tonics. Americans, then, need to become acquainted with a relatively ancient concept that infuses the medical systems of the vast majority of the inhabitants of the earth.
     It was not easy for me to ‘discover’ the true meaning or definition or essence of the term ‘tonic.’ Being a thoroughly Western scientist by training, I have always looked for magic bullets perfectly matched to treat, prevent or cure specific ailments independent of the afflicted human being. Give me a body system or physiological function and I will find something out there, drug or herb or some other dietary supplement that will push one way or the other. I will seek out the interactions, the contraindications and the side effects, and underlying genetic mechanisms, and will build a trail of cause and effect perfectly unassailable by critics and skeptics. I will build hypotheses, models, theories, and paradigms that seek to encompass all scientific truth and in some small way – if everything goes according to plan – my colleagues and I will save the universe.
     It was with great humility and awe that I began to sense the incredible power in the simple tonic.
Still, my scientific training propelled me to attempt the unraveling of the secrets of the tonics. Americans can easily share with me the difficulty in accepting the existence of agents that stimulate and depress the SAME system at the SAME time. Our universe is composed of separate and distinct medicines for treating ailments with opposite manifestations. We would never use a drug meant to treat high blood pressure to treat low blood pressure. Worse than that, there is nowhere in our conceptualization of the universe that provides justification for even imagining the existence of medicines that could do both.
The great truths of nature and morality are often expressed as paradoxes. Tonics are a great paradox. Lowly in stature, mighty in potential.
     Gradually, slowly, I began to put the tonic concept together. Yes, there was good scientific evidence that consumption of dandelion root and gentian root not only gently increased the digestive capacity but that they also restored health and balance to the organs of digestion in general, providing a healthy foundation for the entire panorama of digestive system disorders. Such a marvel is totally absent for orthodox medicine and is inconceivable within its architecture. To understand a concept, you have to have a hook to hang it on. There is no hook for tonics in Western medicine. But they do exist in other medical systems.
     As I began to understand the dual nature of the tonic – what I now understand as the ‘complete’ nature of the tonic – I began to comprehend how the Chinese used the term in referring to the activity a very special, highly revered, group of medicines that occupy a central position in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Again, I must emphasize the excruciating difficulty this mental exercise demanded of a Western scientist. But it happened. The light dawned and grew brighter and one day, I realized I had in my possession possibly the greatest truth of my professional life.  Was I the only American that knew this? Was I supposed to become the prophet heralding the great value of tonics on this continent? I searched the herbals high and low. The word tonic was mentioned often, but the understanding was more or less absent or misunderstood by all writers. Rudiments were there; it was apparent that in the first decades following the settlement of America, that tonics were somewhat better understood but the notion was lost by the early decades of the 20th century following the ascendancy of orthodox heroic medicine. And so the necessity for writing Herbal Tonic Therapies was born.

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