142 THE GERM THEORY OF DISEASE. 



were being destroyed by them. He says: "Their relation 

 to the white blood corpuscles is very peculiar. They penetrate 

 into these and multiply in their interior. One often finds 

 that there is hardly a single white corpuscle in the interior of 

 which bacilli cannot be seen. Many contain isolated bacilli 

 only; others have thick masses in their interior, the nucleus 

 being still recognizable; while in others the nucleus can no 

 longer be distinguished; and finally, the corpuscle may become 

 a cluster of bacilli, breaking up at the margin the origin of 

 which one could not have explained had there been no oppor- 

 tunity of seeing all the intermediate steps between the intact 

 white corpuscles and these masses." 



With these facts before us, and with the plain teachings of 

 the relations of the life force to matter, as exemplified in the 

 phenomena of digestion, nutrition and the formation of waste 

 products, it seems to me we must not fail to gain an under- 

 standing of these processes. The cells attacked, either digest 

 the invading germs, or the invading germs digest them. And 

 here, as everywhere else in nature, the stronger will be' the 

 victor. In other cases, as in septicaemia, the excretions of the 

 bacilli do not seem to produce such marked local lesions, but 

 the waste products of the organisms are absorbed and act the 

 part of a diffusible poison, producing the general symptoms 

 manifested in these cases. 



Again, the history of cases shows that sepsis is most liable 

 to occur in the early time of the healing of wounds; at a time 

 when the tissues may be supposed to be still suffering from 

 the effects of the shock. In this case it must be supposed 

 that the tissues are not so well able to contend with the 

 intruding germs as they are afterward, when the process of 

 granulation is going forward vigorously. 



We have also experimental evidence establishing this point. 

 Sonnenschein found that certain bacteria with which he was 



