FUNGUS GERM THEORY. 8 1 



effect it ; for if all in existence at any one time were 

 utterly destroyed, new ones would soon spontaneously 

 emanate from the non-living, and we should be in as 

 bad a plight as before. Minute vegetable germs, re- 

 sembling those to which contagious disease has been 

 attributed, are everywhere, though they may easily 

 escape observation. If, however, the pabulum 

 adapted for them be present, and the conditions 

 favourable to their development exist, they soon 

 grow and multiply, and abundant evidence is afforded 

 of their presence. 



In answer to the observation, that if these fungus 

 germs constitute the morbid material of contagious 

 diseases everyone should be attacked, it might be 

 said, " the organism is not always in a state favourable 

 for invasion, and that it is only in exceptional cases, 

 or in exceptional states of health, that the presence 

 of fungi affects us deleteriously." To this the reply 

 might be, that "there are many kinds of conta- 

 gious matter which give rise to characteristic effects 

 with unerring certainty;" The introduction of as 

 much as would adhere to a needle point into the body 

 of a healthy subject, acting without a chance of fail- 

 ure. If, therefore, we accept this vegetable germ 

 theory of disease, we must hold that there are certain 

 fungi which affect all men in all conditions of health, 

 but which are at present undiscoverable, while other 

 fungi, which are very easily discovered, are not known 

 to affect the organism in any condition of health ; 



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