Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-07-06

the atmosphere that we breathe, the con-
ditions requisite for the maintenance of
| the zymotic diseases are substantially an
| initiated, and the great cause of mdlatse,
debility and suffering is averted. If the
| improvement includes, as 1t often will in
| an incidental way, the correction of by
| grometric conditions tending to the pro-
duction of malaria, the relief will be
| greatly magni6ed. 1t may therefore safely
be asserted, in the light of what We know
of improvements that have been effected
by simple changes OF physical conditions,
that proper application of the sanitary
arts of the engineer would of itself suffice
to save to us the thousand lives now daily
thrown away and to multiply greatly the
happiness and efficacy of myriads whose
sickness, though not mortal, is
PREVIOUSLY PAINFUL AND INCAPAcI-
TATING.
1t is, course, not to be understood that
even the zymetic diseases. which are
chiefly referred to in this paper, are to be
withdrawn from the domain of the phvsi-
clan and intrusted to the unaided efforts of
the engineer. The great advance in sanitary
achievement in the past fifteen years has
taken place not in the field, but in the
laboratory; it is in your profession, not in
ours, that the great wonders have been
wrought.
1t has long been considered that the
rough measures of the drain builder and
the water purvevor were effective in ward
ing of much disease and death, but the
knowledge under which our results have
been achieved has been very largely of an
empirical character. 1t was only when the
biologist entered the arena that real
knowledge of the subject began, and, al
though the biologists is yet only at the
portals of the vast temple of knowledge to
which he has so lately found the key, he
has gone far enough to indicate quite
clearly the reasons for the success of SAM
tary engineering, and even to Justify con-
viction that he has, dimly perhaps, but
surely, indicated new way of escape from
much of our existing
PHYSICAL SUFFERING AND DEATH.
How many of our diseases are caused by
the invasion of specific organisms we are
far from knowing. We do know that some
OF them are so caused, and the study of the
life history of pathegenic microbes has
already indicated more than a possibility,
not only that their invasion may be pre-
vented by suitable measures, but also after
the invasion of our bodies they may be,
by measures yet to be defined, rendered
powerless to perform their appointed
work of injury or destruction. 1t would
indeed almost seem that the elixir, not
perhaps of life, but of health, would be
shown to lie in the death potion of the
microscopic invaders of our blood and
tissues. Until this is definitely shown,
and probably still more after it has been
shown, your profession and ours must work
hand in hand to stay the tide of destruc-
ton by which the community is not only
menaced, but to which it is actually sub
ject and from which it is constantly suffer-
ing.
You need not now be detained for
discussion of the processes by which the
great end in view may be accomplished.
These are tolerably well known, and are to
be better known day by day. What is
necessary is that you, and not only YOU,
but all who aresubject to their professional
ministration and to their influence, shall
be made to know and to feel that this
great calamity is upon us and has been
upon us, in constantly decreasing degree,
for all time, and that it lies within our
power to hasten its decrease in the future
until the conditions of life of this whole
people shall have been made what they
might and should be.
The sole purpose of this paper is to i'm
press upon you the commanding need for
action-an action that shall bring modern
sanitary conditions into conformity with
modern civilization.