Inferior herbs can be toxic if misused. Antibiotics are narrowly focused toxins. Certain botanicals are of a similar dynamic. Traditional Chinese Medicine, for the last 5,000 years has systematically tested, combined and tested further, all imaginable combinations and dosages, on billions of people, observing and noting the results, and refining their system of herbal medicine further. Hence, Tonic herbs earned a special, almost reverent status early on, reserved in antiquity for Imperial rulers, sages and mystics.
Tonics can, in fact, come in many forms - liquid, powder, encapsulated, tablet or a raw botanical.
They contain a wide array of active and sub-active ingredients that have very profound nutritive value. In contrast to herbs, homeopathic remedies are diluted so as to contain at most, infinitesimally small amounts of active substances. The remedies that rated as being of higher potency are often diluted to the point wherein no molecules of the original base substance remain. Herbs, particularly herbal extracts, contain measurable and in most cases concentrated levels of bioactive phytonutrients such as polysaccharides, terpenoids, glycocides, lipids and alkaloids, among others. Homeopathy, while based on a unique philosophy of health, is not incompatible with the use of herbs.