SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLI. No. 1068 



He emphatically dissented from the germ 

 theory, and added 



Carbolic acid is the keystone of the Listerian 

 wound treatment. . . . The germ theory is at fault 

 and furnishes a very unstable foundation for a 

 system of wound treatment. 



Moore, of Rochester, N. T., proposed to 

 exclude the air 



by passing carbonic acid gas directly into the 

 place where the operation is to be performed. In 

 consequence of its being heavier than the atmos- 

 phere it preoccupies the space ( ! ) . 



Campbell, of Georgia, "did not believe 

 that bacteria . . . are the cause of that 

 condition [suppuration]." The various 

 men named were among our foremost 

 American surgeons. 



Lister's opponents entirely missed the 

 great fundamental facts xmderlying the 

 germ theory and Lister's antiseptic method, 

 viz., that infection in all its various forms 

 was always of bacterial origin — a wholly 

 novel and momentous idea. Each form of 

 infection, e. g., tetanus, tuberculosis, ty- 

 phoid, 6tc., it was soon proved, arose in- 

 variably and solely from its own specific 

 kind of germ. Whether carbolic acid or 

 any other germicide was the best was a 

 mere matter of detail and not of principle. 



In commenting on this discussion in 

 which one prominent speaker is said to have 

 asserted that Listerism "is now dead" — 

 a remark I do not find in the Transactions 

 — The Lancet,^ a belated, but then, and ever 

 since, a real convert, truly said 



Surely it is too late in the day to contest the 

 truth of the germ theory. 



Yet even a year later (1883) at the 

 American Surgical Association while B. A. 

 Watson, of Jersey City, fully accepted 

 Listerism, other prominent surgeons of 

 Philadelphia, New York, New Orleans, 

 Mobile, and other cities even declared in 

 the discussion that no surgeon in their 



e July 1, 1882, p. 1088. 



cities or states used the method. McGraw, 

 Of Detroit; Dawson, of Cincinnati; Camp- 

 bell, of Georgia; Prince, of Illinois, were 

 "doubting Thomases," while Kinloch, of 

 Charleston, and Nancrede, then of Phila- 

 delphia, advocated it. 



But if its progress was obstructed in 

 the United States, its foes in Great Britain 

 were even more strenuous and for a sea- 

 son more successful. 



In spite of the striking results in Glas- 

 gow and in Edinburgh Lister was looked at 

 askance as "unorthodox." 



In 1875 The Lancef had said 

 there is less antiseptic surgery practised in the 

 metropolitan hospitals than ever there was. 



At the Clinical Society* in a debate on 

 antiseptic surgery in 1875, Mr. Maunder 

 said with a fine, but, as the event showed, a 

 too precipitate sarcasm: 



Mr. Lister expects to prevent traumatic fever 

 and . . . suppuration. 



Timothy Holmes, while professing to 

 have used antiseptics "for some years," 

 declared his disbelief in Mr. Lister's theory 

 with regard to "germs." The Lancet's 

 editorial on the debate said it was ' ' evident 

 that few of the speakers either place faith 

 in Lister's theory or carry out his practise 

 in full." 



After eight years in Edinburgh Lister 

 was chosen professor of surgery in King's 

 College, London, in 1877. This was the 

 last stand of his opponents. The British 

 Medical Journal, however, heartily urged 

 the appointment of "the great surgeon of 

 Edinburgh." 



October 1, Lister gave his first lecture. 

 He took as his subject "Bacteriology," 

 though not using that title for, as Stewart 

 said, ' ' as yet the science had not a name. ' '* 



^ October 16, 1875, p. 565. 



s Lancet, October 30, 1875, p. 628. 



The earliest instance of the use of the word 

 ' ' bacteriology ' ' I have found is a quotation dated 

 1884 in the Oxford Dictionary. 



