Sweet Gum
Botanical Name: Liquidambar styraciflua
Common Names and Synonyms: American Storax, Gum Tree
Background: Native to the eastern United States, the sweet gum
tree can grow up to 140 feet tall. It has palmate leaves, similar
to the maple leaf except the margins are narrower, or more pointed.
The seeds are grouped on a round spiked-type ball which remains on
the tree throughout the winter into spring. The balsam, which is
made into liquid ambar balm, comes from the bark, and is used in medicine
and perfumery. Dried balsam, called Storax, is used to scent perfumes;
and in the food industry Storax is used to flavor gum and candies.
Sweet Gum in the Cayce Readings
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Edgar Cayce recommended sweet gum for a wide variety of applications including
inhalant, massage oil, mouth rinse, and systemic tonic. The single
most common application was as an ingredient in a vaginal douche or sitz
bath (fume) for healing the female genitalia. One reading (5090-1)
indicated that for this particular woman a sweet gum sitz bath (fume) could
enhance conception.
Cayce Quotes on Sweet Gum
5090-1
When there are those preparations for such, do this
to insure conception, if this is desired at a special period (and those
periods just before the menstrual period are the preferable for conception):
Put into a hot basin of water a sweet gum ball about the size of a small
agate, or say the end of the thumb, in hot boiling water.
Sit over this for some ten minutes, and you needn't
fear, there will be conception.
4890-1
Use, for the condition in the vagina and womb, the
sitz or steam bath, as this: In a crock, or bucket, containing gallon
and a half of very hot water, or boiling (or as hot as body can stand,
see?) add Tincture of Myrrh 20 drops, Tincture of Sweet Gum 20 drops.
Remain sitting over this, with the vagina and the puba exposed to this
steam, see, for at least fifteen to twenty minutes once each day.
Every second or third day use a warm douche of Creolin,
see? and the off day, or every third day, see, following this, use an antiseptic
solution of the Glyco-Thymoline as douche also, see? This had best
be used in Fountain Syringe than in the forced syringe, see, or spray.
4868-1
To give the relief necessary to this body, to overcome
these conditions, we would give that in the system that would produce with
certain vibrations the incentives that would produce elimination, through
the system, in proper form. The body has picked up, or come in contact
with that that gives the necessary condition. Take this:
To one gallon of rain water (we need the nitrates
in this) add:
Sarsaparilla Root.......6 ounces,
Burdock Root............2 ounces,
Prickly Ash Bark........2 ounces,
Mandrake Root..........15 grains,
Buchu Leaves...........30 grains.
This would be simmered, not boiled, until reduced
to one quart. Strain. While warm, add:
Grain Alcohol...........4 ounces, with
Sweet Gum...............3 drams, cut in it.
The dose would be teaspoonful four times each day
for the condition that becomes exaggerated. Through the pelvic organs,
we would take myrrh and balm of Gilead, one-half ounce of each placed in
a container, with very warm water, and steam the parts, so the effect arises
within the system itself will prevent the secretion becoming so aggravating
to the system. Do that, see. Those would be taken once every
three days, for three weeks, see. Tincture of myrrh and balm of Gilead,
one-half ounce each in two gallons of water, very hot, you see.
4809-1
Then, to bring about the normal condition for this
body, we would take in the system these properties as an inhalant for the
condition in throat, bronchials and larynx:
To 4 ounces of pure grain alcohol, add:
Eucalyptol..................................20 minims,
Benzosol.....................................5 minims,
Fluid Extract (in solution) of Sweet Gum....20 minims,
Rectified Oil of Turp........................5 minims,
Canadian Balsam..............................3 minims.
Shake solution well together. Inhale through
the mouth whenever that sensation of coughing is bad, taking two to three
deep breaths, see? When this has been used for two to three days,
change it, see? That is, make a new quantity in same manner, same
proportion, putting chemicals together in
the way as has been given. Shake it every time though before
it is inhaled, keeping it in container at least twice the size of the quantity
of properties.
4555-1
Take internally as this: 6 ounces of the inner
bark of sweet gum tree. Add this to 1 quart of distilled water.
Reduce this by simmering to 1/2 the quantity. Strain off. Then
add 2 pinches of powdered elm bark, see? Then add to this:
Cinnamon water (20% solution).....4 ounces,
Oil of Turp......................10 minims.
Reduce again by simmering to two-thirds the original
quantity - that is, after these are all added, see? Then cut in alcohol
Balsam of Tolu 2 drams. Add to solution. Then add:
Elixir Calisaya...................1 ounce,
Oil of Peppermint.................2 minims,
Oil of Sassafras.................15 minims.
Shake this solution well together before the dose
is taken, which would be a teaspoonful 4 times each day, before each meal
and before retiring.
4399-1
(Q) Is case of an operation where should the operation be and
for what?
(A) From the condition existing through the pelvis it is not
necessary, if this treatment here be given into the system, it is because
the functioning of the organs being in a disturbed condition at the present
time, and through the refunctioning of nerve centers too often to give
the proper vent for all other organs of the viscera and the pelvis and
if we will remove the inflammation we will correct the condition as expressed
here in the pelvis, we would take into the system this:
Sarsaparilla Root..............4 ounces,
Black Snake Root...............2 ounces,
Burdock Root...................2 ounces,
Buchu Leaves...................1 ounce,
Black Haw Bark.................2 ounces,
Flower of Elder................4 ounces.
This would be placed in one gallon of water, rain
water, reduced by simmering, not boiling, to one quart, strain, and while
still warm, add to this 4 ounces of grain alcohol with 3 drams of Balsam
of Tolu and 2 drams of Sweet Gum.
After this has been taken into the system, tablespoonful
4 times a day, we find we have created a different effect of the blood
supplying forces to the system, especially to the hepatics which affect
the functioning of the organs of the torso and of the pelvis, especially
the effects through these are to change the action of the functioning of
all organs of the body, for an operation at present with the condition
of the blood force in the system, and with the action of the heart suppressed,
would prove very destructive to the physical body. After this has
been taken we would use the vibration with the Ultra Violet Ray along the
spine, then across the appendix, especially down the right side, if we
would bring the normal condition more perfectly to this body here.
2720-2
At least three to five times - that is, once each
day for three to five days after menses period - the body should heat water
to the boiling point, pour into a container over which the body may sit
with ease, pouring about gallon and a half to two gallons of water, and
to this add sweet gum (in the gum) fifteen grains, tincture of myrrh tablespoonful,
and let the body - the pubis - be exposed to the fumes as arise from same.
The irritation - as will be seen - will be decreased, and also there will
be the more desire for sex relations and the effect as is produced in the
body from same; for with this constant aversion (with the individuals as
are about the entity), and with this constant drain on the nerve system,
the mental forces suffer sympathetically.
2428-1
Put a pellet of sweet gum, the size of a buckshot,
in hot water and sit over same, with the vagina exposed to same.
This, - with the mental attitude, - will have an
activity upon the body. We refer to the sweet gum from the sweet
gum tree, you see.
1866-2
To 4 ounces pure grain alcohol, add:
Eucalyptol...............20 minims
Tincture of Sweet Gum (in solution)........30 minims
Canadian Balsam..........10 minims
Rectified Oil of Turp.....5 minims
Benzosol.................10 minims
Shake solution well together. Inhale both through
the nostrils and into the lungs through the mouth, see? Not taken
internally; inhaled only. That is, once or twice inhale through nostrils,
for the inflammation as is seen
1211-2
We would use with the rub, or once a day or twice
a day, equal portions of Tincture of Benzoin and Fluid Extract of Sweet
Gum or Balsam of Tolu cut with alcohol; equal portions of these combined,
especially around and under the knee, not only to the knee but in the locomotory
centers of the pelvic portions of the body and to the feet and to the bursa
of the feet, and the muscular forces between the under part of the knee
and heel. All of these areas should be massaged with this combination,
not too much, but just what the body absorbs.
1010-1
Take this in the system only when the body feels it is needed to give
the balance, so should be kept on hand and only taken occasionally:
Take two ounces of the rag weed in its green state gathered as we would
find at the present; this we would put into six ounces of water and steep
until reduced to four ounces; to this we would add the same quantity made
from the green plant known as hore-hound; add to this four ounces of grain
alcohol with two drams of sweet gum dissolved in it. Do that. Take
teaspoonful when necessary for the correction of the condition through
the intestinal tract.
480-34
(Q) My mouth has seemed quite dry - what can be done for same?
(A) Rinse same with a little elm water occasionally; this is
helpful; or a little sweet gum (this better fresh). Any of these
as a rinse for the mouth, you see, and then if any of it is swallowed it
is all the better for the general condition of the body.
Watch or be mindful of the kidneys. Hence
either of these rinses is well for the general system. The proportions
would be about a pinch of the elm to a glass of water. Or if the
Balsam is used, this - of course - should be cut, unless fresh is used
and then it is prepared much as the elm water.
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