Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-07-29
SHALL MAN LIVE?
DR., BrOwn-SeqUard's Vital Principle
Not LikeIytO PrOlOng Life.
Sanitary Knowledge-S Pf6loBgs Life-WOuld
Longer Life Be a. Blessing or
a Curse
Providence Journal.

newspapers have very generally Deen IN
cliued TO ridicule or to doubt the an
nouncenent that DR.. Brown-Sequard,
the venerable French physician, has dis
covered the long-sought- for - vital prin-
cipIe' and produced a coucootioH which
can indefinitely proIong human exist
ence. Men have long since ceased to
seek fer the elixir of life over which gen.
crations dreamed, and most men, let Us
hope, have ceased TO care for il
or think Of the mysterious essence
OF Margrave or Van Heimont Sssdvee
with the same amused pity YitM
which they read Of the painful struggleY5f
the alchemists for the secret which .sh9Bfid
transform baser metals into gOld.sz155 has i,
very naturally seemed absurd, 1fsH, that
great Psychologist of the Nineteenth cen
fury should have seriously set himself at
work TO prove the possibility of the end
sought by man in the middle ages, and
the disposition to regard the story as
hoax is certainly pardonable, despite the
fact that even eminent psychologists Of
the Nineteenth century, have expressed
the opinion that there is no physiological
reason why man should die.
But the story Is not altogether q hoax.
Dr.. BTown-SequaTd has not prOfessed TO
have found the secret OF earthly immOr-
tally, but he certainly appears to have
persuaded himself that be has discovered
something very nearly akin to that
''vitaI principle'' which Mr.. Alfred r.
Wallace still believes to exist. The dis
tiuguished Frenchman-sO says that able
review, the New York Medical Journal
has long believed that such a principle
resides in one Of the organs of the body,
al least so far that the blood passing
through it is enormously Influenced
thereby. With blood taken from the
veins OF young animals he has
therefore for series of years been in
ocUlatinG old and broken down animals,
and with such surprising results that he
has more recently been experimenting
upon his own system. DR.. Brown
SeQUard Is by no means a young. man
he is fast nearing fOur-scOre-but thesS
subcutaneOus injections seem to have ga4
juvenated him, as well as the aniT28ls
upon which he first made his tests. An
old ana decTepit dog became endowed
anew with freshness Of comparative
youth; and he himself, as he tells the
Paris SOciete de BioOgie, has felt his
muscular strength in great measure re-
turned and his mental vigOr materially
increased.
This is practically all that is yet known
in this country of the result Of the doe
tors experiments or of his deduction
concerning them, though it is safe to say
that ne has had no thought beyond the
possibility of so restoring the waste Of
the system as to temporarily postpone the
day Of inevitable dissolution. But q
clam even of so much will not be re-
ceiVed without much questioning and
after the fullest confirmation, because Of
IS
larry because of the radical and almost
fundamental changes in our view
OF physiological laws which it in
wolves. Indeed, it IS not easy
to belieES without the evidence
of years Of the most careful and the wild
est eytendeda ekRerin&snt and obServa-
ton, that there 6Sn be any single prOphy-
Tactic against all the lis OF mortality.
Nor is such a thing TO be desired as
that man should violate the laws of his
being and still escape the penalty of his
misdeedS.
Much has been written upon this sub
ject III recent years. Mr.. II. c. Kirk
published an interesting little work upon
''The Possibility OF Not DYING some
half dozen years ago. DR.. W A.
Hammond back III the sixties advanced
the theory that there is no physiological
reason fCT. death; Sir Spencer Wells, the
famous English surgeon, has quite re
Gently expressed lis belief that the nat
uTal duration of human lie, should be at
least one hundred years, with >ap occa-
sIODal extension of some ten or fifteen
years more; and even a century ago
Bichat, whose mtuitions wonderfully an
ticipated the conclusions of a later sci
ence, held that the normal longevity Of
our race should De at least uiuety-slx
years, basing his inference upon the fact
that the life term of ali known man,,
mails exceeds at least six times the period !
of their growth. But all these have /
based their opinions upon the belief thai !
the decay Of the human organism could !
be prevented, not Tepaired-that is, by
heathful surroundings, by proper |
food and drink and cloth
ing, 10y abstinence from i'm
moralities and excuses physical and
mental And it is only q long life thus
obtained that it is for the good of hu-
mainly TO acquire. The theory is simple !
and If Is something more than plausible.
The animal body differs from any inOr- |
EaniC machine III the fact that It possesses !
the power of self repair, and so long as
the repair can be precisely adjusted TO |
the waste life viii continue. save by the |
interruption of accident. The question,
of course, is whether il Is practically /
possible to make these two actions ex-
exactly counterOalance each other for an
indefinite period, or even tor any very
great number Of years beyond
what is now considered the normal dura- !
ton of life. Possibly not, and yet it IS,
on the other hand, not little significant |
that the average duration of human life !
has been Increased something more than !
six years within the past half century,
as n result of cur greater sanitary kuowl- |
edge and our knowledge Of the means to !
prevent disease The list OF pTeventable !
diseases is already large one,
ana is being augmented from year |
to year. Where we shall stop no /
man can say, though the ability we
have to Prolong life already far exceeds |
our willingness 10 apply the knowledge. !
a hundred years may not be an over !
estimate of the natural limit Of life few !
generations hence, and we ourselves I
might indeed be much nearer that limit /.
if u nations we strove honestly and per /
sistenJly after il. At least il IS to be said I
that long life thus gained is the only life /
worth having, aud the only lie which /
IA