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Cayce Health Database
MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS IN THE EDGAR CAYCE READINGS
by Ray Bjork, M.D.
[NOTE: The following report was presented to the Third Annual Symposium
of the Medical Research Division of the Edgar Cayce Foundation in Phoenix,
Arizona, on January 11, 1970.]
Multiple sclerosis, commonly called MS, means "many
scars." MS is one of the most widespread degenerative diseases of the
central nervous system (brain, spinal cord). It is acute or chronic,
usually slowly progressive, occasionally remittent. Pathologically,
it is characterized by scattered patches of destruction of the fatty
covering of the nerves called myelin sheath. Frequently it follows
a course of exacerbations (increase in severity of symptoms) and remissions
(decrease or abatement of symptoms.) Exacerbations may occur at intervals
of weeks, months or years. Some have remissions for as long as
twenty-five years.
Some patients rapidly become incapacitated and completely
disabled. Average duration of life has been considered to be ten
to fifteen years following onset of the disease, but many now live much
longer. Often MS is referred to as a disease "scattered in time
and space." It is the common crippler of young men and women, usually
attacking them in their prime of life. In two-thirds of the cases,
it occurs between the ages of 20 and 40. Rarely does it occur before
the age of 10 or after 50.
There is slightly higher incidence among women.
Some reports indicate about 60% female patients and 40% male patients.
It appears to be more common in northern latitudes, but the reason for
this is not understood. No relationship to cold weather has been
demonstrated. Prevalence is roughly 40 to 60 per 100,000 in the
north in contrast to 10 to 13 per 100,000 in the south. It is estimated
that there are 500,000 cases in the United States. Without the myelin
sheath, the nerve impulses or body signals go wrong. Destruction
of the myelin sheath (demyelinization) causes either the complete stoppage
of nerve impulses, thus producing paralysis of the parts of the body supplied
by these nerves, or impulses pass through the affected nerves so weakened
or altered that the parts of the body supplied by these nerves function
in disturbed fashion. Scattered destruction of the fatty sheath
accounts for the partial impairment of the body functions. Preservation
of the nerve fibre (axis cylinder) explains the possibility of remission.
When both the fatty sheath and the axis cylinder of a nerve are destroyed,
impaired body function becomes permanent. Paralysis occurs late
in the disease. Chronicity is a distinguishing feature of the disease.
Scattered throughout the nervous system are areas
of myelin. Myelin is a fatty, protective sheath which may be likened
to the insulation on electric wire, without which nerve impulses may be
short circuited resulting in loss of power. The destroyed myelin
is replaced by scars which are first soft, then in time become more dense
and destructive. The scar at first may only impair the transmission
of message from nerve center to muscle. Later the formation of other
scars, resulting from subsequent attacks, leads to greater disability.
Multiple sclerosis is not a killer, and life expectancy for most patients
is not much less than the average. It is the progressive crippling
caused by MS that creates personal and social problems.
Victims may be ambulatory, ambulatory with aids (such
as a cane, crutches, or leg braces), wheelchair bound, or bed-ridden -
depending on the extent of the nerve damage. Due to the remissions
which characterize MS, patients have found it possible to walk again after
a long dependency on crutches or wheelchair. Such symptom disappearances
are usually temporary, although some experience a stabilization of the
disease, a condition which may continue for some time.
In addition to the United States and Canada, Australia
and the countries of northern Europe report a high incidence of MS; the
incidence is low in the Orient, Africa, northern South America, Caribbean
and Mediterranean.1 Sex, race, occupation, urban or rural
living are not factors; MS occurs equally in all. It is not a venereal
disease and is not contagious. MS is not hereditary. It may
be that a predisposition is passed along but until the cause is learned,
it won't be known why one of a family is more vulnerable than the other
members. More than one case in a family has been known to occur.
It is not a mental disease. MS'ers may experience emotional disturbances
and personality changes, but these are not necessarily imposed by the
disease.
Scientific Research and Etiology of MS
After 100 years of observation and study the cause
of multiple sclerosis is still unknown. Many things are dependent
upon discovery of the cause: early diagnosis, effective treatment and
control, cure and rehabilitation for future victims, arrest and remission
of symptoms, rehabilitation. The disease has never in any given
patient proved to be the result of a specific cause, nor has the disease,
as it exists in man, ever been experimentally reproduced in animals.
There are many theories. Some are based on the
similarity of MS to other diseases, some on the response of patients to
certain environmental factors, some on examinations of blood, some on
affected tissues and cells revealed through autopsies. Some of these
hypotheses are:
(1) That a virus or spirochete may be the cause.
(2) That MS has an infectious origin.
(3) That it is due to a metabolic disturbance or defect.
(4) That loss or inactivation of enzymes necessary to myelin formation
or replacement is the reason.
(5) That blood clotting, or venule spasm or some imbalance in the blood
is the source.
(6) That allergens are to blame.
(7) That some unidentified poison is the agent.
These and others have been probed and reinvestigated.
None has been proved. Advances in our knowledge of the geographic
distribution of MS may well be a most important and recent development.
Observations throughout the world have been reported by researchers in
various places. Alfred R. Shotin, Melbourne, Australia, reported
a study of the geographic distribution of MS the world over. In
this analysis, he suggests the environmental factor. He believes
the dietary habits of man seem to correlate with the geography of the
disease. He speculates that the susceptibility to MS is the intolerance
to gluten (the protein of wheat and other grains) and this may be an inherited
characteristic. This hypothesis conforms with criteria laid down
by some neurologists and epidemiologists.
This knowledge has held the attention of Dr. Roy L.
Swank2 who directs research at the University of Oregon Medical
School and Clinics. These findings have been scrutinized for possible
meaning. Experiments to test the suggested significance of these
observations have been, and are being made. If this analysis is
correct, the concept of intestinal origin of this perplexing disease may
provide a pathway to its solution.
There will be seen a rather interesting correlation
between these findings and the statements that Edgar Cayce made relating
to the inability of the body to absorb gold and this in turn bringing
about the pathology which provides the disease which we call multiple
sclerosis. This will be discussed more extensively later on in the
paper.
PROGNOSIS
The course of MS is variable and may be classified
as follows:
(1) In rare cases, a sudden, severe course may lead to death in six to
twelve weeks.
(2) In other patients one sees a fairly rapid downhill course terminating
in death in five to ten years. These patients usually have a number
of recurrent, rather severe episodes with intervals of relative recovery
during the first two years, but are then left with increasing difficulties
(following successive periods of worsening) often not living a year or
two after becoming bed-ridden.
(3) In some patients, the course is characterized by relatively minor
attacks of brief duration (days, weeks) separated by periods free of symptoms
(months, years) and followed by slowly, insidiously progressing disabilities.
This may lead, after ten to twenty years, to some degree of chronic disability
such as weakness in an arm or leg, which may not materially shorten life.
(4) In some patients, the course is characterized by gradually developing
loss of the ability to move and a slow, steady downward progression, with
fluctuations in the symptoms too slight to be called a relapse or remission.
Onset later in life is more apt to be followed by this type of course
and in general has a poorer prognosis than the remittent type beginning
before the age of 25 years.
(5) In infrequent patients, the few widely spaced attacks early in life
are never followed by subsequent recurrence or by progressive disability,
the disease presumably remaining quiescent throughout the balance of a
normal life span.
In general, MS is a disease of the nerves, not of
the muscles. However, all muscular activity (contractions, relaxations)
are controlled by nerve impulses. Muscles are made stronger and
bigger by exercise. Nerve energy is restored by rest. Thus
the MS'er (MS patient) has to adjust his daily life so as to do a little
standing, a little walking and sitting. It is not good to sit in
a chair or lie in bed all the time. After prolonged sitting in a
chair or lying in bed one loses the ability to use his legs. It
is most important to conserve energy. The MS'er has none to spare
or waste.
Certain factors seem to bring on relapses:
- poor health;
- generalized infections;
- illness with fever;
- too much exertion or undue fatigue
- injuries;
- allergic diseases; and
- emotional disturbances (tensions, worries).
At the present time there are no specific agents for
the treatment of multiple sclerosis. However, we feel that every
MS'er may benefit to some degree from the skillful use of those modalities
which are well understood, economical, widely available, and encompass
a wide range of safety.3
In addition to the wide variety of physical therapy
techniques which the physician may find at his disposal in caring for
the multiple sclerosis patient, a new dimension is added when one looks
at some of the concepts of causation and therapy that are spelled out
in the readings given on this disease by Edgar Cayce.
ETIOLOGY AND MECHANISM OF PATHOLOGIC PHYSIOLOGY SUGGESTED BY THE READINGS
The basic biochemical process stated in reading 907
was that MS was the result of a lack of gold upsetting the normal balance
of metabolism which caused a glandular imbalance and in turn resulted
in a hormonal deficiency or imbalance. This hormone was said to
be necessary for the proper functioning of the nerves.
Multiple Sclerosis in the Cayce Readings
The reason for lack of gold was tied to a defect in
the assimilating system (probably digestive system) which in turn was
kept in proper working order by the proper hormonal balance from the glands.
(Assimilation - the transformation of food into living tissue; constructive
metabolism.) Because the glands were in turn dependent upon the proper
amount of gold in the system, this would lead to a circular feedback relationship
between gold, glands, assimilating system.
Thus, according to the readings, MS is not caused
simply from a lack of gold in the diet, but perhaps from a lack of the
capacity of the digestive system to assimilate gold or perhaps inability
of the body to use the gold assimilated. In reading 907: "What glands
are involved?" The answer was given: "Those about the liver and the gall
duct."
The only endocrine glands in that anatomical neighborhood
are: (1) Islets of Langerhans in the pancreas and possibly (2) the adrenals.
Perhaps the lymph nodes around the liver and gall duct are indicated,
but no specific hormone-producing function is known for them.
In reading 1623 and 1031, the liver, pancreas and
spleen are mentioned as if they were "glands." The liver was said to enable
the other glands to function normally, presumably by the production of
a substance which affected the glands. (3275) In 1031 a thyroid
and liver balance was described. In 2564 the adrenals were mentioned
in regard to the effects of mental attitude upon them. The readings
are not clear as to the exact relation of the liver to pathologic process
in MS. In 907 the excretory function of the liver is mentioned as
an aid in the assimilation of food in cooperation with the pancreas.
See also 1623 and 3907. This would presumably be the production
of bile which aids in the digestion of fats which are absorbed in the
small intestine through the lacteals.
Other readings implied there were glands within the
liver itself (2983, 3306). In 5238 one lobe of the liver was said
to have softened, and in 2997 a whitening in the liver was described.
Thus, the exact relationship of the liver, glands in the liver, and the
other glands remains unclear.
However, the glandular disturbances which the readings
indicated in a general way to be caused by an imbalance between the digestive
system, the amount of gold in the body and the liver was repeatedly described
by the readings as the direct link in the malfunctioning of the nervous
system in MS. The missing substance from the glands was supposed
to be a nutrient to nerve tissue and the nerves were repeatedly said to
lack a proper balance of nerve energy or "stamina." ( 1031, 1865, 2983)
In 907 a lack of nervous energy caused a poison to
form in certain nerve cells and then the other surrounding cells are poisoned,
resulting in a pulling apart and elongation of originally round cells.
The hormonal lack was said to cause a breakdown of
the cellular forces in the nerve walls. This breakdown of nerve
"walls" coupled with the description in 907 of wasting away or dissolving
of the nerves could be taken as a description of the pathological loss
of myelin sheath or white matter of MS. There was not a mention
of this specific term in the reading. The lack of gray matter was
mentioned in 3626.
Pathologically, there is damage of both the "white"
myelin sheath and "gray" axon in the disease, although demyelination is
usually more common and occurs first as the pathology of MS the lack of
myelin is most obvious in the spinal cord and brain.
In summary of the theory of the etiology and pathologic
physiology of MS as presented by Edgar Cayce, it must be said that:
- Balance or equilibrium between the organs and systems were emphasized.
- Some factors which are not part of the current medical knowledge
about the disease were mentioned.
- Glandular imbalance caused the lack of hormonal system which acted
to form a poison which was responsible for the pathological process
in the brain and spinal cord.
- The glandular imbalance was caused by a lack of gold and by lack
of a substance produced in the liver. All of these factors were
to be interrelated by the proper functioning of the assimilative system.
- A genetic factor was mentioned.
- An infectious agent was explicitly denied.
TREATMENT
- Use of low voltage wet cell battery carrying the "vibration" of
gold to the body.
- Massage.
- Diet.
"Atomic effect" of gold, as seen in the readings,
is needed to establish the balance in certain glands that might produce
those hormones which are essential to the maintenance and proper rebuilding
of normal nerve tissue. This is not ingested, not injected, but
vibratorily applied by the battery, followed by massage. A diet
which follows most of the concepts of diet in the readings is suggested.
Treatment for MS has to be of long duration - from
three to seven years, usually. Of importance is completeness,
continuity, consistency, hopeful mental attitude by the patient and by
those who give the treatments.
Much of this material has been worked up in a report
for the Association for Research and Enlightenment by Walter Pahnke, M.D.
I am drawing, to some extent, from his information which can be found
in the circulating files.
I am currently working with a number of MS patients
as part of the research program of the Edgar Cayce Foundation. Because
of the long, extended nature of the disease, no preliminary report can
be given, but we can be assured that a beginning has been made researching
into this very difficult condition.
REFERENCES
1. McAlpine, D.; Lumsden, C.E.; Acheson, E.D.; Multiple Sclerosis;
Baltimore; The Williams and Wilkins Company; 1965
2. Swank, R.L.; A Bio-Chemical Basis of Multiple Sclerosis;
American Lecture Series Publication No 417; Springfield, Illinois; Charles
C. Thomas, Pub.; 1961.
3. Alexander, L.; Berkeley, A.W.; Alexander, A.M.; Multiple
Sclerosis Prognosis and Treatment; Gantt, W.H., Ed.; Springfield,
Illinois; Charles C. Thomas, Pub.; American Lecture Series Publication
No. 405; 1961.
[Note: The preceding report was written by Ray Bjork, M.D., and is excerpted
from The A.R.E. Journal, March, 1971, Volume 6, No. 2, page 53,
Copyright © 1971 by the Edgar Cayce Foundation, Virginia Beach, VA.]
APPENDIX
READING NO. 907-1: THE ETIOLOGY OF MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS
1. GC: You will have before you the request from Dr. Charles
G. Taylor of ... St., New York, N.Y., for a research reading on the disease
known as Multiple Sclerosis. You will consider the following statement
from Dr. Taylor: "The material pathology of Multiple Sclerosis is
a disease of nerve fibres in the spinal cord and brain. The insulating
sheaths of these fibres are evidently attacked by some destructive agent
which causes them to 'melt away' and be replaced by fibrous tissue."
Please answer the following questions.
2. EC: In giving the true pathological condition, as we find
this condition of the spinal cord and of the brain is rather the result
of conditions which arise in the assimilating system from the lack of
a balance in the hormones of the blood supply.
3. And it is then a nerve condition, but IMPOVERISHED from the lack
of this condition in the bloodstream, or the glandular forces as supply
from the system those elements necessary to give the elasticity or that
activity which is necessary.
4. Then this is the source, and the condition in the spinal cord and
brain is the effect of that called Multiple Sclerosis.
5. The condition, of course, in each individual may be said to be
a law unto itself. This, to be sure, is dependent upon that influence
from which the activity of the first cell is taken in a body or entity.
6. Now as the nerve system is that channel through which the atomic
energies, or electronic atomic energies pass for activity, there is then
the lack of certain elements within the system and in the abilities of
the body to produce through the activity of the assimilating system that
of GOLD.
7. Ready for questions.
8. (Q) Is this condition produced by an unbalanced diet,
or functional failure of glands? (A) A combination!
For as has just been indicated, in determining the factor as to whether
this is a glandular or a diet condition, there must be the HISTORY of
the case itself considered, and the effect there has been upon the parentage
as to the sufficient amount of the cellular force ABOUT each of those
atomic forces as go to make up the first cell - or the first fetus itself.
9. (Q) If it is a case of unbalanced foods, what should
be added?
(A) This depends upon the progress of it. But as has been
indicated, it is then the effect of gold - the atomic effect of gold that
should be added to the system.
10. (Q) Which glands are involved?
(A) Those about the liver and gall duct.
11. (Q) What is the nature of the process of the breaking down
of the sheaths of these nerve fibres?
(A) Nerve fibre is both positive and negative, or both white
and gray matter, as it passes through the activity of the system.
When there is a deficiency of that which supplies to the negative or positive
force, there is a drain then that begins upon the system. And as
there is the lack of those elements that give stamina or energy to the
activity of that portion, it begins first then in those forms of a drain
or strain and these GRADUALLY then take away or they dissolve, or their
cells instead of being round in their nature become elongated and gradually
pull apart. Thus the system attempting to build resistance from
same causes the losing of the use of any of the energies necessary to
replenish same.
It's a WASTING away.
12. (Q) Describe the original process which begins in the liver
and gall bladder area.
(A) The cellular force here, or the glandular activity, draws
from the spleen, pancreas and the juices or the excretory functioning
of the liver, in the activity of assimilation with the drainage forces
from the lacteals.
This then, lacking in the energies, gradually builds
conditions that become hardening forces; which form in that connection
between the gall duct itself AND the activity to the larger glands
in their assimilation such that a hardening of that portion begins.
Then these gradually act upon the nerve system;
by first, as it were, the loss of memory for the moment, then the conditions
that may be set up either in the lower portion of the spinal cord or that
about the brush end, and those activities gradually increase until they
affect or move along the cord itself (in a portion of same) to the brain.
And these begin then in the activity upon the use of various portions
of the system.
13. (Q) Is any outside agent or germ involved in this process?
(A) We do not find it so. Rather is it the lack of keeping
the proper balance about each cell in its division as it increases in
its activity.
14. (Q) Is this a lack of nerve energy to this particular cell,
or a poison which is forming and attacks?
(A) A poison, naturally. The lack of there being sufficient
[nerve energy] makes for a poison to other cells about the original, or
the central forces of such activity.
15. (Q) What can be done to prevent this disease?
(A) Keeping a nominal balance of those things in the system that
make for keeping the normal balance of the elements or the metals for
the system.
Most of these may be tested especially from the
spermatozoa.
16. (Q) What is meant by that last statement, - please explain?
(A) The reproductive glands first become noticed, as to the lack
of those elements for reproduction. Then when these are discovered,
- a lacking in these, - there would be the addition then of the gold necessary.
17. (Q) Is this best to be given vibratorially, or taken internally?
(A) Vibratorially is always better for ANY that is a preventive
or a destructive force to those influences from within a cellular activity.
18. (Q) What general steps should be taken in curing it?
(A) As has been indicated, or may be drawn from an analysis of
that just indicated, there should be the proper distribution. This,
of course, depends upon very much the advanced stage of the condition.
This is presupposing that it's taken with the first symptoms, see?
or the beginning of sterility, or the inactivity from the system as it
may be called. The adding then of those vibratory forces as combined
with the elements in the diet would be to make for sufficient of gold,
silver and iron in the bloodstream.
19. (Q) What suggestions may be given now as to further research
readings on this subject through this channel? And explain for Dr.
Taylor's benefit the source of the information given here.
(A) This may be taken by first the examinations of that as we
have just indicated, and as to how it checks with those conditions existent
in the varying stages of that which has been called Multiple Sclerosis.
Then those questions relative to the conditions as they advance, or the
effect which has been and is created in the various stages upon individual
cases. Then there may be asked for that as would clarify same in
the mind of one desirous of making application of information that might
be given.
Sources - the universal consciousness.
20. We are through for the present.
Note: The above information is not intended for self-diagnosis
or self-treatment. Please consult a qualified health care professional
for assistance in applying the information contained in the Cayce Health
Database.
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