42 EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCHES 



LECTURE II. 



ON THE ATREPTIC FUNCTION. 



IN my first lecture I dealt with the anchoring 

 phenomena exhibited by the different kinds of 

 parasitotropic substances, which thus aid the 

 body in the process of recovery, and I chiefly 

 discussed, in their historical sequence, the three 

 therapeutically important agents, the antitoxins, 

 the bacteriolysins and the opsonins of Wright. 

 I, however indicated, that with these substances 

 the possibilities were not yet exhausted. To- 

 day I shall speak of a different series of processes 

 which may aid the organism to fight its adver- 

 saries, processes of a more passive nature, in 

 which a secretion of active attacking substances 

 does not take place. 



You will remember that in the early days 

 of immunity the exhaustion theory played an 

 important role. Pasteur thought that when 

 the body overcomes an infection, there are 

 removed from it certain substances necessary 



