Il6 APPLICATION OF METHOD IN INFECTIOUS DISEASES 



decomposites, or secretions, are formed, which are 

 in themselves disharmonious. The future must 

 teach us whether quantitative conditions are decisive 

 or not, but it is at least possible that a secretion of 

 quite normal composition may act disharmoniously 

 with the plasma, when it passes into the blood in too 

 large quantities. 



In pathological cases, too, we shall be able, by 

 following up a particular disease, to determine the 

 nature of the reciprocal relations in which different 

 organs stand towards each other. It may be noticed, 

 perhaps, that at the beginning only one organ shows 

 signs of dys-function, that another then follows suit, 

 and so on. We shall also be able to make thera- 

 peutical studies. If a therapeutical measure should 

 result in the disappearance of the defensive ferments, 

 the therapy would have to be estimated otherwise 

 than if this were not the case. 



A large field of study is presented by all cases of 

 degeneration, such as muscular and nervous degen- 

 erations, as well as by processes which result in the 

 formation of decaying products of every kind, such 

 as putrefaction of tissues, or absorption of exudates, 

 of extravasations of blood, or of thrombi, &c. 



The infectious diseases obviously supply us with 

 an extensive field of study. On the one hand we 

 shall have to decide whether defensive ferments exist 

 that are directed against specific micro-organisms, 



