738 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION I. 
Now, after two years of this life, he is a perfect young’ 
‘Hercules—grubbing and felling trees, digging, ploughing, 
and equal to all kinds of work. 
The same sunlight which transformed such poor material 
into these fruits and flowers first put colour into this 
man’s blood, then he could digest his food, he wanted larger 
and yet larger quantities of food, which well digested and 
assimilated, gave strength, and threw off disease. Before 
coming here, he had swallowed buckets full of iron, and 
other tonics; operations by noted London Surgeons, had 
utterly failed to cure his disease, whilst his poor digestion 
had been coaxed by delicacies, and forced by bitters, until 
the stomach rebelled against everything. But the sun just 
laughed at the lot, and sunlight speedily took the place of 
iron, operations, and bitters. Thus, this beautiful piece of 
mechanism called man was brought into existence by 
energy derived from the sun, this mechanism was thrown 
out of gear and nearly wrecked by being deprived of the 
sunlight, and was again restored by the sun, when it was 
- given a chance to do so. The disease from which he suffered 
was scrofula, and scrofula, like consumption, is produced 
by microbes, and these microbes, or, bacilli, die when 
brought into plenty of sunlight. If you put say a pair of 
wet boots into a dark cupboard, they will, in a few days, 
get covered with mould, which will eat into the leather 
and destroy them. Now boots, or leather, is animal matter, 
and mould is a microbe, which feeds upon, and destroys 
it, as long as the boots are in the dark. But bring them 
out into our bright sunshine, and see how quickly the mould 
will die down and disappear. In this case a few spores of 
the mould plant, which thrives in dark, damp places, fixed 
on to the boots, and rapidly multiplied, soil and situation 
being favourable. Microbes which attack and destroy our 
bodies are subject to similar law. They, too, thrive and 
multiply in dark places, and especially delight in dark, 
damp rooms, but hate sunshine, because it is their great 
enemy. We very rarely, or never, see scrofula or con- . 
sumption in people who live out in our sunshine. The 
microbe which produces consumption is now as well under- 
stood as the mould-plant which grows on our boots. It, 
too, thrives in dark, damp rooms, and multiplies enormously 
when it enters the human body, if that body is in a 
condition favourable for its growth; but if it enters a 
healthy body, out in the bright sunshine, it just dies, and 
is thrown out. The modern treatment for curing consump- 
tion, when the lungs and body are infested with myriads 
