HOMMAIRE DE HELL justifiable. Excusable homicide is then that which is caused by self-defence, or tbe preven- tion of great crime, or accident. It is excusable by reason of self-defence, if it was strictly necessary for this purpose, and not otherwise. We believe that there is no rule of criminal law which ought to be more certain, and more universally acknowledged, than that homicide in self-defence must be grounded upon a strict and absolute necessity. It cannot be doubted that any one may save his own life by taking- the life of his assailant ; but it is equally cer- tain, as matter of law, that he must not secure his safety by homicide provided he could secure it in any other way, as by retreating, or seek- ing refuge, or inflicting a less than fatal injury. We suppose that any difficulty which belongs to this subject must attend upon the applica- tion of these principles, and not upon the prin- ciples themselves. Thus, it is certain that the laws of England and of the United States agree in an absolute refusal to recognize the point of honor in cases of homicide. Juries, and possi- bly courts, may be influenced by it, perbaps unconsciously ; but the law ignores it. If one attacks another with every form and method of insult, and the attacked party, finding no other way of stopping the insult, or escaping from it, puts the assailant to death, it is felo- nious and not excusable homicide. In refer- ence to the excuse of accident also, it may be mingled with another. Thus, while one has no right to protect himself from slight bodily injury by putting his assailant to death, or to use that means of preventing wrongful conduct not of the gravest sort, yet he has a right to defend himself against any assault, and to pro- tect himself from any injury, and to prevent any wrong doing. And if in all this he uses no weapons likely to produce death, and does not manifest by violence and excess a fatal purpose, he would be excused although the death of the wrong doer was the unintended result. Thus, one may turn a mere intruder out of his house, although he is quiet there, and, if necessary, put him out by force ; but must not put him to death because he will not go out. But if, while using only such force as may seem neces- sary, he kills the intruder, he would be ex- cused. In reference to this right of self-pro- tection, the question has been raised whether the use of spring guns is lawful. It seems to be the law that one may use a spring gun to prevent felony, and that homicide caused by it would be excusable ; but that it is not justi- fiable to use such instruments for protection against mere trespassers. HOMMAIRE DE HELL, Ignace Xavier Morand, a French traveller, born at Altkirch, Nov. 24, 1812, died in Ispahan, Persia, Aug. 29, 1848. He studied at the college of Dijon and at the school of mines in St. Etienne, and after having been employed in railway surveys was in 1835 appointed by the Turkish gov- ernment to make a scientific exploration of the region around Constantinople. In 1838 410 VOL. vin. 50 HOMOEOPATHY 783 he was commissioned by the Russian govern- ment to explore the Crimea and the steppes of southern Russia. Ill health compelled him to return to France in 1842, when he present- ed to the academy of sciences a paper on the difference of level between the Caspian sea and the sea of Azov ; and for his first volume of travels (Strasburg, 1844) he received the prize of the French geographical society. In 1845 he was commissioned by the French au- thorities to explore the Black and Caspian seas ; and after having made in 1846 a survey of the former and subsequently explored the interior of Persia, he succumbed to illness at Teheran. The numerous geological specimens which he had collected were purchased by the French museum of natural history. The narrative of his later travels, Voyage en Turquie et en Perse (4 vols., Paris, 1854-'60), was published at the cost of the French government. The fourth volume, containing an account of his last jour- ney, was edited by Jules Laurens, the painter, who was his travelling companion. ADELE, his wife, born about 1820, accompanied him for five years, and assisted him in Les steppes de la mer Caspienne (3 vols., 1844-'7), contribu- ting the picturesque descriptions and the sketch- es of manners, character, and physiognomy, and in his last work on Turkey and Persia. She also published in 1845 a volume of poetry, Reveries cPun voyageur ; and in 1860 appeared her Voyage dans les steppes de la mer Caspienne et dans la Rmsie meridionale (2d ed., 1868). HOMOCERCAL. See HKTEROCERCAL. HOMEOPATHY (Gr. %>*, like, and nade'iv, to be affected), a system of medicine first definitely propounded by Hahnemann. (See HAHNEMANN, SAMUEL.) Its cardinal principle, from which it derives its name, is expressed in the aphorism, Similia similibus curantur, "Like cures like; 1 ' that is, the proper medi- cines to be administered in disease are those which produce similar symptoms in a healthy person. This principle had been partially enunciated by Hippocrates, the "father of medicine" (about 460 B. C.), who asserted that medicines sometimes acted according to the rule of similia, and at others according to that of contraria ; thus intimating the truth of both the allopathic law of contraria and the homoeopathic law of similia. Antiphanes, who lived about the same time, wrote a poem which contains the earliest known announce- ment of the homoeopathic theory. Galen (born A. D. 130), the first great light in medical history after Hippocrates, first gave form and shape to that law of contraria which for many centuries ruled the medical world. Starting up, however, from time to time, during the centuries which intervened between Hippo- crates and Hahnemann, were Paracelsus, Stahl, Haller, and others, who insisted upon the truth of the law similia, and pushed their investigations with more or less success in that direction; but it was not until it attracted the attention of Hahnemann that it created
