SIXTH LECTURE. 



WASTE PRODUCTS, CONSIDERED WITH REFER- 

 ENCE TO THE GERM THEORY OF DISEASE. 



In the beginning of the germ theory controversy, Schwan 

 seems to have recognized that carbonic acid and alcohol were 

 the excrementitous products of the yeast plant (Annalen der 

 Pharmacie, Band. 29, S. 93 und 100). Liebig, in opposing 

 this theory, alludes to this and recognizes that this conclusion 

 would necessarily follow, if fermentation were proven to be 

 the result of life force. (Agricultural Chemistry, page 124.) 

 Since this time, however, this idea seems to have been lost 

 sight of by writers on this subject. Sometimes we see inde- 

 finite allusions to it; but there is no definite expression of 

 the general law, that all forms of life must have their specific 

 waste products, as they are seen in the animal forms. The 

 remoleculization of matter is continuous with the duration of 

 life. The life force is dependent upon the remoleculization 

 of matter for its support. No manifestation of the life force, 

 in any form whatever, can be conceived of without this accom- 

 paniment. As the steam engine is dependent upon fire for its 

 power, so is the life force dependent upon molecular changes in 

 matter for its continuous existence. As steam is dependent upon 

 heat for its generation, and the expansive force by which the 

 engine is driven, so is matter dependent upon the life force 

 for the changes of molecular form through which that life is 

 cognizable to our senses. We can have no conception of life 

 in the material form without the accompaniment of these 

 changes. Any other form of life than this must be that spiritual 

 condition which is not recognizable by our physical senses. 



Ill 



