CHAPTER VIII 



SOME APPLICATIONS OF THE LAWS OF PROTOPLASM 



There is no authentic record of the time when 

 disease first laid its palsied hand on living things. 

 The vast remains of organisms found massed as 

 fossils in numerous rock outcroppings suggest 

 that destructive epidemics have been common ever 

 since life began. After all of the prodigality of 

 Nature in insuring that life shall be perpetuated, 

 it seems strange that the inter-relationships of or- 

 ganisms should have taken on such fatal conse- 

 quences. The cause of all the greatest catastro- 

 phies, whether geologic or modem, has not been a 

 physical manifestation, such as a volcanic eruption 

 or poisoning due to the escape of noxious gases 

 from the cavernous depths of the earth, but in the 

 main has been due to the action of microscopic 

 plants and animals liN'ing as parasites. In this de- 

 pendent relationship, they cause disease and death. 



Human effort to prolong life has ever stimu- 

 lated man to try to understand the causes of death. 

 If one measures his interest by the financial stand- 

 ard, he has come to have an intense desire not 

 only to know more about this phase of protoplas- 



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