208 



THE AMERICAN MONTHLY 



[November, 



to invent methods suited to any spec- 

 ial requirement he may meet. It 

 takes more time during the process, 

 but saves time in the end, and no one 

 who expects to be a fine worker in his- 

 tology can afford to neglect it. For the 

 anatomist who cares for cell relations 

 more than cell structure such great 

 care is not necessary. If the cells but 

 keep their place, it is enough ; but to 

 be sure of anything about cell struc- 

 ture the study must be slow, with con- 

 stant care that the cell is kept as per- 

 fectly vminjured as is possible. 

 o 



The Germ Theory. 



BY ROMYN HITCHCOCK, F. R. M. S. 



The truth of the germ theory is still 

 far from being established in the minds 

 of a great many thoughtful members 

 of the medical profession. Honest 

 scepticism, founded upon careful con- 

 sideration of the experiments relied 

 upon to sustain the theory, is the right 

 of every scientific man. But unless 

 it can be shown that the demonstra- 

 tion is imperfect, that there are evi- 

 dent, or at least probable, sources of 

 error which can be pointed out. mere 

 disbelief in the theory looks very much 

 like unreasoning stubbornness, or im- 

 perfect knowledge of the subject. 



Few persons, physicians or others, 

 are aware of the thoroughly scientific 

 basis of the germ theory to-day. 

 Few have even a faint conception of 

 the immense amount of work of a 

 crucial character that has been done 

 in the laboratories of Germany , France 

 and the United States, to test this 

 theory. The literature is voluminous, 

 and not generally accessible, while 

 the abstracts and notices of it that 

 have been published in English peri- 

 odicals give but a faint idea of the 

 amount and character of the work 

 done to sustain the conclusions. Such 

 being the case, doubts concerning the 

 theory are perhaps proper, and an 

 indication of reasonable conservatism , 

 but disbelief and opposition to it can 

 only be due to imperfect knowledge 

 or perverted judgment. 



As an indication of the manner in 

 which the theory is occasionally^ at- 

 tacked, we may cite an instance when 

 a gentleman, an able and respected 

 practitioner of medicine, compared 

 the action of a culture fluid of disease 

 germs with that of the poison of a 

 rattlesnake, pointing out that, since 

 the snake poison cannot be regarded 

 as a living organism, we have no 

 reason to suppose that the organisms 

 of the culture fluid are the active 

 agents in that. Perhaps not. But a 

 very important fact in this connection 

 is here ignored. The germ culture 

 can be indefinitely increased, while 

 the snake poison cannot. The cul- 

 ture fiuid affords nutriment to the 

 living organisms, and under proper 

 conditions of temperature they will 

 continue to multiply for an infinite 

 number of generations, and the suc- 

 cessive cultures will be as active in 

 producing disease as the first. 



The precise connection between the 

 living organisms and the disease they 

 produce is still the subject of investi- 

 gation. That specific living organ- 

 isms do produce specific diseases 

 when they multiply in the body, or 

 in culture tubes, is no longer a matter 

 of doubt ; but just how they act is, 

 perhaps, not fully understood. It 

 has lately been observed that a culture 

 fluid, in which microbes have been 

 growing, retains its active properties 

 even after the living organisms are 

 entirely destroyed. In other words, 

 in this instance, at least, the fluid 

 contains a poisonous principle in so- 

 lution which gives rise to a specific 

 disease just as • certainly as do the 

 cultures of the germs themselves. 

 Thus, although the parallelism be- 

 tween the poison of a snake may 

 be strengthened by this view of the 

 case, vet the fiict remains that the 

 poison of certain diseases is produced 

 and propagated by the growth of 

 microbes. 



This view, which has been gradu- 

 ally gaining supporters for several 

 years, removes one gi-eat difficulty 

 that has alwaj^s been in the way of 



