Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-16

of disease. These statements are obviously
not absolute. but they are practically true.
And the overwhelming percentage of human
disease Is due to minute living creatures
which we may call microbes In this article.
The advantages of this name are that 1t
was used by Pasteur, who discovered those
tiny creatures, and that it means simply
little living things If | gave them any
other name We should get into trouble.
year or two ago l should have called them
bacteria, but the bacteria are plants and
now we know that little animal creatures
may cause disease 1t is a tiny animal or
ganism that causes malaria, and two distin-
guished American observers are in the act
of proving that other animal organisms
cause smallpox and scarlet fever. L have
reason, also. for saying that yphus fever
will also found to be due to an animal or
ganism. So we must no longer talk about
bacteria, but about microbes, which may be
either vegetable or animal.
These creatures are ubiquitous. They are
lying in my skin and yours by millions
We are full of them. So are all organic
tissues. Nansen found them near the pole;
they abound in the tropics. They are In
the air and the soil; in water and in wine.
Without some of them human life would
not continue upon the earth; without others
human life would be infinitely happier, less
painful and of longer duration. and of
greater capacity for physical and mental
work than 1t is at present 1t is these
latter, the microbes of disease, for which
l venture to prophesy a coming doom. In
the whole universe there are no enemies to
the human race powerful, so numerous,
so malign these. Let us take a speci-
men. The bacillus tuberculosis, or tubercie
bacillus, is responsible for about one death
in every five or six that occur on the whole
planet. Judging by the most ancient rec
ords, 1t has been ever thus. AS L write
here in London l know that one of my Eel
low countrymen or country women is dying
of some form of tuberculosis every seven
minutes. This continues day and night,
year in year out. Yet England is lightly
afflicted with consumption, as compared
with many other countries. This accurSed
little plant likes to toy with Its victims. 1t
fortunes them for, on the average, about
four years before its work is done. 1t pre-
fers to seize upon the choicest splrlts.
Biography tells us that the world has lost
incalculable treasure by the ravages of this
one microbe. To take music alone, Mozart,
MendelSsohn Schubert and Chopin fell VIC
tins to it, and none Of them had reached
the age of forty. Yet a few minutes OF
sunlight will kill this bacillus by thou
sands.
Now the race has already recognized
certain measures to be taken against as
ease microbes, although the method which
l am disposed TO advocate has had little at
tention paid to it. One of the methods Is
vaccination. Nowadays one can be vac
cnated-so to speak-not only against small
pox, but against plague and typhoid fever
and diphtheria and several others. Some
one asked me the other day whether the
time would come when we would be eX-
times in our youth to secure protec-
ton from as many diseases. The question
was really quite reasonable. When pre-
ventive serum against consumption, for in
stance, is at length obtained, no sensible
person will delay in availing himself of 1t;
and the same assertion applies to pneu-
monia and many other diseases which may
befall any of US. Anything as safe and as
effective as vaccination against smallpox
would be accepted by the great majority OF
prudent persons. In other words we should
employ a, large number of persons in Guilt
waiting microbes, injecting them or their
poisons into animals and going through a
number of complicated and expensive proc
eSSes.
But there is a better way than that and
l venture to predict it's general acceptance
and ultimate success with most remark
able consequences, because there is already
sufficient evidence to show what is possible,
and my most cogent evidence is for
tunate consequence of the late war between
the United States and Spain.