110 THE GERM THEORY OF DISEASE. 



PARASITES. 



After what I have said, the examples I have given, it seems 

 plain that the work of these lowly forms of life is to cause a 

 remoleculization of the substances with which they come in 

 contact. 



This power of remoleculization of certain forms of matter 

 is one of the especial physical attributes of the life force. It 

 is the one great power upon which life depends for its con- 

 tinued existence. No form of life can continue to exist with- 

 out itself exhibiting this power, or borrowing directly from a 

 form of life that does exhibit it in a marked degree. (It is 

 claimed that certain forms of parasitic plants draw from and 

 appropriate to themselves food material which has been assimi- 

 lated by their host. Even here it is most probable that there 

 is a form of remoleculization.) 



Now, in case of parasitic plants, if this remoleculization is 

 of such a nature that the results are poisonous to the host, 

 disease follows. If, on the other hand, the results of this 

 remoleculization should not be poisonous to the host, the only 

 harm resulting would be merely from the great crowd of the 

 parasitic forms. 



The history of the experiment and observation upon this 

 subject, leaves no reasonable room to doubt that remoleculiza- 

 tions occur which are entirely harmless, and that remoleculi- 

 zations occur with the production of the most deadly poisons. 

 While every imaginable grade between these two may occur. 



