HABITAT OF DISEASE GERMS. 2T 



perhaps five or six weeks, according to the weattier. It 

 is not ^^ spoiled." On the contrary, it becomes tender 

 and acquires a flavor which epicures admire. This can- 

 not be done where the meat freezes, and in a warm, un- 

 ventilated place it would become unfit for food in a very 

 few hours. The cause of this is the formation of a 

 micro-organism, the result of fermentation or decomposi- 

 tion (see Plate XX., Nos. Y7 and 78). Of course I ex- 

 clude reference to the injury that may be done by in- 

 sects, the effect referred to implying no other influence 

 than such as is derived from contact with the atmo- 

 sphere and the germs contained in it. 



Watch Nature, observe her operations, pause and 

 think over them, and many useful lessons will be 

 learned, many old prejudices swept away, and number- 

 less errors will be corrected. Mere book-readers are 

 theorists ; Nature's readers are practical. The former 

 are apt to take for granted what others tell them ; the 

 latter judge for themselves. Thecrrists work blindly ; 

 they cannot see what they may, and will not see what 

 they should. They may stumble over things, but they 

 refuse to accept truths which Nature constantly holds 

 up before them, and it is in this way that processes that 

 are recognized in some things are ignored in others, be- 

 cause they seem to be at variance with theory. The full 

 importance of fermetitation, its general recurrence in 

 various processes of Nature, and the import of micro- 

 organisms and microbes in the causation of natural 

 phenomena, kamong which the production of diseased 

 conditions is not the least important, have never been 

 hitherto adequately acknowledged ; and it is because 

 observation has been too little made and theory has 

 occupied men's minds. I have sufficiently outlined the 

 true cause of disease. The instances I have given should 

 suffice to satisfy any onft-who is free from prejudice and 

 ' from the cobwebs of the old school of teachers. They 

 are not beyond the reach of ordinary intelligences. 

 Nature, in her operations, abhors complicated processes. 

 She works by simple methods, and her laws are as wide- 



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