324 SYMB10GENESIS 



to the nerve-cells have been so serious that they cannot return to their 

 normal state, although the poison affecting them has disappeared. 



And thus we get a good illustration of what I mean by the 

 slow (biological) death of in-feeders; for, as I have already 

 pointed out in previous volumes, what happens thus in 

 individuals also happens on a grand scale, though more 

 gradually, in Nature, and leads to the extinction of species. 

 The substance of nerve-cells represents some of the highest 

 physiological assets, i.e., investments of biological capital, 

 that exist, and when this valuable substance is pathogenetically 

 affected by the advent of debasing, i.e., deleterious substances, 

 a general retrogression ensues which may end in extinction of 

 a species. Occasional attempts at recovery there may well be, 

 but they must be increasingly frustrated by a continuance or 

 intensive increase of the same morbid conditions which made a 

 recovery necessary. 



Certain foods like milk and eggs which inevitably induce the anaphy- 

 lactic state after intravenous injection, never, or hardly ever, induce 

 it by alimentary ingestion. 



Let well alone, then, as regards " intravenous" injection. 

 But let us also be sparing in our reliance upon the digestive 

 powers which frequently cannot bear great quantities of 

 "rich" fare, and are thus obliged to give up the protection 

 they have so long and so faithfully afforded. Let us take to 

 heart Cicero's admonition: 



Non intelligunt homines, quam magnum vectigai sit parsimonia. 



We are further told : 



Ed. Lesn6 and L. Dreyfus tried to discover if anaphylaxis could be 

 obtained by direct injection into the portal vein, and gave interesting 

 proof that such an injection is equivalent to injection into any vein 

 whatsoever for the purpose of producing the anaphylactic state. 



It follows that if ingestion does not fnduce the anaphylactic state 

 it is not because the hepatic and intestinal glands and lymphoid tissues 

 have altered the albumin, but solely because changes in the materials 

 introduced through the mouth have taken place in the intestinal tract 

 during gastric and intestinal digestion which render them harmless. 

 And as a matter of fact Ed. Lesne" and L. Dreyfus showed that the 



