The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1909-02-07

10 be destroyed by the ozone of the
air, the direct sunshine from the sky
or the frost OF the winter. Today how
ever when the conquest Of steam and
electricity has provided railroads and
multiplied useful products, people tend
more and more to live together in the
great and growing cities. Germs
thrive in ill-ventilated, overheated and
poorly lighted rooms; and so the battle
OF the present age has become mainly
a struggle with the bacteria OF disease
First Discovery Of Germs.
In the seventeenth century, While
Galileo was using the telescope to ex-
piore the mysteries Of the starry
heavens, similar use Of the micro
scope on earth objects led to the de-
lection Of the hitherto invisible mi
erobes. The century was one remark
able Tor its discoveries; its expanding
knowledge, its visions of the unseen. It
was the century Of Milton. Bacon, NAL
pighi, Harvey and Calico. Though
Sallieo discovered also the MICROSCOPE
ne preferred TO reveal the secrets of
the heavens and TO explore the depths
OF space with the telescope. But a con-
temporary of his, a Dutch lens maker,
Leeu Wenhock, directed the miscroscOpe
10 the investigation Of things infinitely
small, and conducted his research
among the very arsenais OF life and
ueath-the regions of the animalcuiae
These he was the first to discover. de-
tectlng their presence III water. In the
saliva, and upon the tartar Of the teeth.
fet more than century must stu
eiapse before a germ could be convict
ca as the true cause Of disease and as
the worst of all the naurderers of the
human family One hundred years
after Leeuwenhock had seen the ant
maleulae, Davaine and Eayer captured
the anthrax bacillus The germ theory
OF disease had been known for more
than 2,0oe years. The earliest reference
10 II occurs in the treatise, De Re
Rustica," Of Tarentius Rusticus. He
wrote; If there are any uarshy places
little animals multiply which the eve
cannot discern, but which enter the
body with the breath, through the
eases"
All through the middle ages this
theory survived and was more or less
logically maintained. But il was
Deeuwenhock who first saw these mi
croscopic creatures, and il is to him
that we owe this greatest of all bioIog-
zeal discoveries. His descriptions of
what ne saw in this new world Of the
infinitely small are highly interesting.
Ancient Theories in Life.
The early Greeks and Romans be-
lieYed that life originated spontaneous
iy' Thales Of Miletus held the theory
that life developed from moisture
AnaxiInander claimed that life origin
ated from inorganic mud. Aristotle
taught that frogs and cells had their
origin in dead matter. Virgil, in his
Georgics, gives instructions as to how
70 make bees. Philippe Buonanrie, a
jesuit missionary of the seventeenth
century, writes that animaiculae and
worms have their origin from rotten
lumber wood; that these change to
butterflies and then to birds. Van Hell
mot, IN the same century, gives q pre-
ScriptiOn for making mice: IF sojIed
linen be squeezed into the mouth of a
vessel containing some grains of wheat
the grains are transmitted into mice in
about tTenty-One days" The follow
ing is his recipe for making scorpions:
scoop out a hole in a brick. Put into
it some sweet basil crushed. Law a. sec
ond brick on the first, so that the hole
is perfectly covered. Expose the two
pricks to the sun and at the end of a
few days the smell Of the sweet basil
acting as a feTment will change the
herb into real scorpions" Other pre-
scr1ptions were written for the produc-
ton of various forms OF animal life.
Modern Observation Of Facts.
The first blow to spontaneous genera
ton of life-the citadel of atheism. by
the way-came from Francisco Redi in
1876. He discovered that If fresh meat
Is screened from flies, mazgots never
develop in it. Huxley claims that this
was the foundation Of future bacterio-
logical technique. TIL then the scien-
lists had believed that all flesh and
vegetables contained ingredients which.
afuer death, regenerated into living
forms. But from this time onward q
war was waged between those who be-
lieved that life originated spontaneous
ly and those who held the correct view.
Bitter was the strife, and the question
was not definitely settled until the mid
die of the nineteenth century. As lately
as 1858 Pouchet published a work that
bore the following title; Notes on Veg
etable and Animal PrOtO-organisms
Spontaneously Generated in Artificial
Air and Oxygen" Finally, in 1852. Pas
teur settled the question definitely,
when he showed that spontaneous gem
GRAFTON is wholly chimerical. These two
facts, the discovery Of the micrObe by
Leeuwenhock and the demonstration
that life does not originate sponta-
neously-are among the greatest dis
coveTies of all the ages. Their import
ance is really greater to every student
Of history than Marathon, Thernopy-
lac, Waterloo OF Sedan; and the names
Of Leeuwenhock and Pasteur deserve to
become as familiar as those of Napo-.
leon and Caesar.
We are indebted for the facts about
the history of microscopy and the dis
covery of germs to DR.. Sundvsll of the
university, who will next week con-
tribute to this series paper on the
bacteria.