The Sun.
London, England, 1870-04-30 00:00:00

THE GERM CONTROVERSY.

The present position of the important questions recently
raised by Professor Tyndall, is well set forth in an article
in the Pall Mall Gazette. Mr. Tytidall's most interesting
experiments on the filtration of air by cotton wool, and
the value of the illuminating electric beam as
an instument of demonstration, was followed by
an announcement that the cause of putrefaction
and its associated phenomena of animalcule life
was proved to reside in germs capable of removal
by the process of filtration. He especially relied upon
an observation of Professor Lister, of the Glasgow Infir-
mary, that air filtered through the lung, and reaching
blood effused into the cavity of the chest in cases of
injury from broken rib, produced none of the putrefactive
changes in the blood which air unfiltered and entering
through an open wound was very liable to cause. He
announced, in fact, that he had, with the help of this
obsetwation of Professor Lister, married to his own previous
observations of the filtering power of cotton wool, achieved
a physical demonstration of the truth of the germ theory of
putrefaction. This announcement immediately brought Mr.
Tyndall face to face with an adversary. Putrefaction
be it observed, is a process of change in an organic fluid
marked by the development of living organisms, bacteria,
monads, &c. Dr. Bastian replies to Mr. Tyndall that far
from the " origin of putrefaction being placed beyond
dispute " as being due to the sprouting of "seeds or eggs
floating in the atmosphere," he is prepared to shew that
putrefaction with tbe development of living organisms,
can and does occur in organic solutions retained-
in a vacuum, in hermetically sealed vessels, which
have been subjected to such a temperature as is
capable, according to the verdict of all persons hitherto
concerned, of destroying all germs of organic life. The
importance of this statement will at once be obvious. If
putrefaction can occur, if new organisms can be formed by
the changes taking place in a fluid not accessible to the
germ-bearing atmosphere, and in which all existing germs
have been destroyed by 260 degrees of heat, it is obvious
that the germ theory of putrefaction, which Mr. Tyndall
declared to be be demonstrated, is, on the
contrary, in danger of refutation. Of course, the
onus of proof will lie more heavily on Dr. Bastian
in the matter. The experiments to which he refers
have not yet been subjected to the rigid criticism of com-
petent critics, although their general character is now
tolerably well known. The scientific accuracy of Dr.
Frankland is a sufficient guarantee that the solutions were
well made, that the air was well exhausted from the ves-
sels,.and that they were subjected to a bond fide boiling at
a temperature of about 260 degrees in a Papin's digester.
Eminent microscopists have seen the organisms which
have sprung up under these remarkable circumsrances,
and they will remain for further examination. The criti-
cism which they will surely provoke will be of the most
searching kind, for they renew once more under conditions
of peculiar severity the bases of a theory of spontaneous
generation or heterogenesis which has as many attractions
for one kind of scientific mind as it has elements of repul-
sion for another. The doctrine is as-old as literature, and
yet has all the freshness of novelty each time that it
reappears. The literary ancestors of the bacteria of Dr.
Bastian, or whatever novel organisms he may have in store
for us, are the rats which, according to Plutarch, sprang
from the soil of Egypt, the bees which Virgil evokes
from the putrefying flesh of an ox, the mud eels
of Aristotle, the microscopic animalcules of
Needham, the organic molecules of Buffon, the
spontaneously generated organisms of Lamarck, the
monads of Oken, and the heterogeneous ovules of Pouchet.
The special point of interest in the research wnich Dr.
Bastian announces seems to be this. He has accepted
frankly the utmost restrictions, and has overpassed the
severest tests imposed by the adherents of the doctrine of
universal evolution from germs, and has triumphed in spite
of them. Instead of filtering the air, which, unfiltered, is
supposed to carry the germs, he has called in the aid of
Dr. Frankland 'to adopt the most rigorous methods of
exhausting- and excluding it. Instead of submitting the
fluids which were the subject of experiment to a heat of
110 degrees Centigrade, which the champion panspermist
Pasteur has declared to be thoroughly destructive of any
living things contained in the solution, he has subjected
them to a. temperature varying from 148 degrees C. to 152
degrees C. Frankly accepting and going beyond the
precautions demanded, he claims to have found in
these solutions so treated living organisms, "many of
them altogether new and strange." The importance of
the discussion thus introduced anew into the arena of
science is very obvious. One thing may be claimed in
advance in respect to the debate, and this hint is already
called for in some measure by the rather high-pitched
notes of the introductory chords, sounded by the
two gentlemen who have appeared before the
public. Heat, which plays so important a part
in the experiments, should be carefully excluded from the
discussion of them. The interesting correspondence to
which we refer partakes of the controversial rather than
the purely scientific spirit. No doubt, however, when
the subject in debate is removed to the calmer atmosphere
of the Royal Society, somethihg of this hot spirit will
i
abate. The matter s one of extreme difficulty, and
fraught with very important conclusions. It demands
very cool, critical. and impartial handling.