, 1886-02-07
ACOMMON AFFLICTION.
BRIEF LECTURE ON THE CAUSES
AND CURE OF COLDS
Some People Always Taking d-N an
Addiction Belonging to Frigid Regions-
Cnusc Of Consumption
PicurIsy. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.

"No aniiction, +" said the lecturer, was so
confuou to mankind, and yet nothing SO
cal.iAitous. a man might escape politics.
mntrimony, and nearly everything else,
hut he couldn't escape taking cold. Some
people were always taking cold. Nearly
every disease in the catalogue had been
attributed to taking cold. TIL ancient
practice among physicians was to define
the nature Of a disease and What its fu.
ture would be. The modern doctors went
further and investigated the cause OF
disease. The doctor said he proposed to
show that taking cold did not cause all
the diseases, and taking cold" was a good
deal OF a bugbear. More harm was caused
by scare and by trying to keep from tax
ing cold than In the thing itself.
NO COLDS" IN THE COLD REGIONS.
In the colder countries people did mo-
take cold at all. What he meant by this
was that the fact OF feeling cold did not
make a mnn take cold. The three factors
OF taking cold are. Airy motion, meis-
ture, and reduction OF temperature, but
neither of these three factors alone would
cause II. A man would not take cold
from being In a hurricane, by taking a
cold bath, or by a change in climate.
The old time doctrine WINS that the arrest
OF the secretion OF the skin caused a cold.
This was fallncious. A man could take
cold from having his hair cut, from laying
off II collar. wearing thinner stockings, OF
anything Of that kind.
Cold, he maintained, was caused by
evaporation and perspiration. There was
nothe theory that had been hand
somely demonstrated That is, that II
was caused by the blood vessels. All
know that in q hot room the blood circu
lates freely and the face and body become
flushed. Going into extreme cold there IL
an opposite effect, though the contraction
Is not immediate. Colds never caused
lasting disease unless the organs left af
fected were already diseased.
A mother often says that her daughter
contracted disease coming out OF a thea
tire; getting her feet wet, coming from a
ball, or something Of that kind. This
was entirely false. Consumption is not
caused by wet air, cold air, etc. 1t was
caused by poisoned air and hot air. The
Indians never had a case of consump
ton.
CONSUMPTION, %PLEURIsY. RHEUMATISM.
Consumption invaded localities of dense
population. People who work in shops
and factories and AVE not much outdoor
exercise have consumption. 1t is in
herited, and to a certain extent can be
communicated from n germ. Sailors who
are wet half the time and exposed in all
kinds OF weather rave not one case of con
sumption in seventy. In n city where o
large class Of men were engaged in un
loading cargoes from ships and standing
in water half the time there wa not 8
case Of consumption in 700. 1t was claimed
that pneumonia was caused by cold. This
was equally wrong.
Pleurisy and rheumatism were neither
caused by cold. People would say that
bronchitis surely was caused by cold. BY
no means. Rather by floating organisms
that take Judgment. He would not den,
that cold might be the exciting cause anr
arouse a disease that had been dormant
The best and healthiest place is out OF
doors. Here wind swept AWAY the germ
of the disease in the air. These germs arr
housed within four walls, where people
breathe them. He would not say that
colds did not cause some diseases, for in
stance, muscular rheumatism, infantilt
paralysis, and n certain order of Bright'f
disease.
How to get rid OF or escape a cold would
be a question asked. II II man stood on
the street and allowed himself TO get
chilled through he would take cold. Ii
he walked and kept the blood in circula
ton he would not. Rubbing was a good
preventive; the massage treatment fol
instance, being a good thing. One Of the
cures for n cold is a hot bath, but il in
Obliged in at the wrong time aud in the
wrong way it is liable to a%ggravate the
cold u person already has.-Cincinnati
Cor. Chicago Tribune.