PREFACE AND SUMMARY OF CONTENTS. XV11 



the efficiency of all organic functions. Finally, it has suggested 

 that in addition to these agencies, all leucocytes and, under 

 certain circumstances, the plasma, contain a protective agency, 

 trypsin, which, with Metchnikoff's phagocytic cells, serves to 

 destroy micro-organisms and convert their toxins and other 

 albuminoid poisons into harmless products. Considered jointly, 

 these various factors seem to us to represent the aggregate of 

 vital phenomena. 



We have termed "Immunizing Medication" the use of 

 remedies to arrest diseases during their incipiency by stimu- 

 lating the functional activity of the adrenal system. Indeed, 

 in the light of our views, it becomes evident that during epi- 

 demics, after injuries received in places thought to contain tet- 

 anus saprophytes, after bites of presumably rabid animals or 

 venomous animals, or after infections of any sort, we can cause 

 in our blood-stream a sufficient accumulation of phagocytes, 

 trypsin, fibrinogen, and oxidizing substance to offset the lethal 

 tendency of these pathogenic elements. But it is not only in 

 acute affections that protection can thus be acquired. Inherited 

 vulnerability to tuberculosis, for example, is, in truth, nothing 

 but congenital adrenal insufficiency, a low grade of general 

 nutrition, which it is within our power to correct by the appro- 

 priate use of the many remedial agents which science has placed 

 in our hands. 



The main cause of death during acute diseases was also 

 studied. Not only were the classical teachings regarding the 

 importance of the blood's alkaline reaction emphasized; but 

 the very fact that the various leucocytes were found to dis- 

 tribute their peptones, myosinogen, fibrinogen, etc., by migrat- 

 ing in every direction, raised the need of an adequate propor- 

 tion of alkaline salts in the blood-stream to the position of a 

 sine qua non as regards the continuation of life, especially in 

 febrile disorders. Indeed, the rapid utilization of alkaline salts, 

 especially sodium chloride, in the organism, and the fact that 

 they are inadequately, if at all, replaced through their normal 

 channel, the digestive tract, during disease, proved to be the 

 predominating cause of death. 



The foregoing summary can only be said to include some 

 of the more important processes, physiological and pathological, 



