BACTERIAL INOCULATION 243 



no matter how attractive and possibly of superior 

 value, for, by the skilful association of all, cure will 

 be best promoted and facilitated. Wright's doctrine 

 has become classical: " The medical man who has re- 

 course to vaccine therapy ought to have familiar ac- 

 quaintance with the microbes which affect the human 

 body. He ought to appreciate the fact that vaccines 

 owe their efficacy to the reaction they set up in the 

 tissues, and not to any action exerted directly by the 

 vaccine upon the invading microbe. He ought to have 

 mastered the general principles of immunization. He 

 ought to know in connection with each vaccine the 

 minimum effective dose, i.e., the dose which gives the 

 minimum immunizing reaction without any interven- 

 ing negative phase ; and the medium or average dose, 

 i.e., the dose that gives, after a negative phase, a more 

 powerful immunizing reaction. He ought to know the 

 general conditions which affect the sensibility of the 

 organism. He ought to understand how to adjust the 

 dose to the requirements of the individual patient, 

 and he ought to have a knowledge of the conditions 

 which obtain in the focus of infection, and of the 

 methods of circumventing the difficulties which are 

 introduced by these conditions." 



It is extremely improbable that bacterin therapy 

 as practiced by the average general practitioner is 

 destined to realize the full measure of its promise. 



