August 8, 1902.] 



SCIENCE. 



219 



1^11(1 his recent volume on the 'Principles of 

 Sanitary Science and Public Health,' with 

 special reference to the causation and preven- 

 tion of infectious diseases, will be received 

 with intense satisfaction by students of this 

 subject. He has been the biologist to the 

 State Board of Health of Massachusetts 

 and also professor of sanitary science and 

 the public health in the Massachusetts In- 

 stitute of Technology for a number of years, 

 and his opinions are, therefore, entitled to 

 great weight. His work is as clear and ac- 

 curate as his lectures, and it is well for man- 

 kind that his teachings are now accessible to 

 a larger number of students, especially as we 

 thoroughly endorse his quotation from Lord 

 Derby that 'sanitary instruction is even more 

 important than sanitary legislation.' The 

 work is divided in three parts. Part I. deals 

 with 'Health and Disease'; Chapter 1, on 

 health, old age and disease — a classification of 

 diseases according to their place of origin; 

 Chapter 2, on the causes of disease, ancient 

 and modern theories; the zymotic or germ 

 theory of infectious disease; Chapter 3, on 

 the rise and influence of bacteriology; trans- 

 formation of the zymotic into the zymotoxic 

 theory of infectious disease; and Chapter 4, 

 on the sanitary aspects of the struggle for 

 existence; parasitism, health and disease in 

 terms of general biology, vital resistance, sus- 

 ceptibility and immunity. These chapters are 

 written in a masterly style and are pregnant 

 with facts clearly and concisely presented. We 

 are pleased that among the theories of the 

 eighteenth century regarding the causes of dis- 

 ease, Hahnemann's pretensions receive atten- 

 tion in a quotation from the 'Encyclopaedia 

 Britannica,' 9th edition. Vol. XII., pp. 126- 

 129: "ITahnemann taught that disease is to 

 be regarded as consisting especially of the 

 symptoms of it as experienced and expressed 

 by the patient or as detected by the physician ; 

 in other words that the chief symptoms or 

 the 'totality of the symptoms' constitute the 

 disease, and that disease is in no case caused 

 by any material substance, but is only and al- 

 ways a peculiar, virtual, dynamic derange- 

 ment of the health. " Diseases (introduction 

 to the 'Organon,' p. 17) will not cease to be 



spiritual dynamic derangements of our spirit- 

 ual vital principle." In all countries the doc- 

 trine of homeopathy is still without broad sci- 

 entific recognition. * * * Modern Miedicine is 

 doing some of its best work in showing the ma- 

 terial and the visible character of the causes 

 of many of the commonest diseases and sug- 

 gests this in many cases where it has not 

 yet been demonstrated. The cause of many 

 diseases is shown to be a living germ, or par- 

 ticle, which can be discerned under the micro- 

 scope, can be carried on a lancet or in a tube 

 and inserted under the skin so as to produce 

 its peculiar disease. * * * The causes of 

 other diseases are often not merely visible 

 under the microscope, but coarsely visible. 

 * * * The lead which paralyzes the painter's 

 wrist is not a 'spiritual' thing. It is an ac- 

 cumulation of matter in the vcrong place and 

 enters his body in palpable quantities, and, 

 what is more, can be recovered in similar 

 quantities from his body. So with uric acid 

 or its salts in the blood of a person who has 

 inherited his father's gout, and perhaps his 

 port wine. It is not a 'spiritual' affair at 

 all, but can be demonstrated chemically and 

 under the microscope. The itch to whose 

 mysterious workings Hahnemann attributed 

 two thirds of the internal diseases of the body, 

 including mania, cancer, gout, etc., is easily 

 demonstrated to be dependent on an ugly crab- 

 like insect, which can be destroyed in a few 

 hours with sulphur, when there is an end both 

 of it and of the itch." In spite of the rotten 

 foundation of Hahnemann's teachings, a 

 monument has been erected to him which oc- 

 cupies one of the most conspicuous sites in 

 the national capital. 



We like our author's paragraph wherein he 

 says: "If diseases due to defects or flaws in 

 the vital machinery are to be avoided, this is 

 obviously to be done only by improving and 

 perfecting the apparatus, which is a compara- 

 tively slow and difiicult matter. To make a 

 family of weak constitution strong is to re- 

 constitute its entire physical basis, and if this 

 can be done at all, it may be only after genera- 

 tions shall have come and gone. It must be 

 done by careful living and good feeding, 

 wise intermarriage and severe natural selec- 



