The Washington times., 1914-08-20


Even in our own day no less a prac-
l teal scientist and philosopher than
Prof. Emil MetchnikofY of the Pasteur
Institute of Paris has written impor-
tsnt monographs upon the method de-
vised by him and his pupils for pro-
longing our three-score years and ten to
that OF the Giant Tortoise in the New
York Zoo, who has alreaoy passed his
second century mark.
1 The eminent Prof. Metchnikofre
method is to imbibe vast quantities
of Tactic acid bacteria that live. null
tiply, and have their being in sour
milk.
| Life Is Immortal.
| Prof. Jennings, of Johns Hopkins,
whose studies of age and youth, life
and death, have been made also upon
a tiny microscopic creature-an ami
malculae called paramecium. a slip
per-like mite of the 'infusaria"
| species-has gone at his investiga-
ton much more thoroughly and
scientifically than has any of his pre-
1 decessors or contemporaries. Even
] the work of Prof. MetchnikoR pales
into the play Of a schoolboy beside
the stupehdous research of the Johns
After reviewing all the previous
work done all over the world in the
\ perpetuation of life, Prof. Jennings
finds that one paramecium could be
prevented from growing old. degen-
Grating or dying, through 1742 gen.
| erations, merely by changing its
everyday diet, from the ordinary food
la tea made from hay-to beef tea.
/ Again. when sickness or degenerative
signs of life began to appear. If a
1 ~ N hfflt af hro in irrfN x-oc
l given, many new generations would
follow. Each parameciun gives
birth to it's offspring as bacteria do.
by dividing into two. Thus. IL at the
proper moment the diet is modified.
final age and death can be indefinite
! ly advanced to remote future
DO growth and birth by simply d.
viding. as bacteria paramecium do.
result in degeneration. senility and
ldeath?" asks Prof. Jennings. IF so.
laboratory methods, put off forever
all possibility Of gray and grabbed
Iage?"
Paramecium Kept Young.
DR.. Enriques. anothor skillful biologist
like Prof. Jennings, discovered that one
cause of senility and decay. degenera-
ton and death was the presence Of bac-
terra in the food and watery habitation
OF Ine pdIdIieCluHl Unless the SOIu-
tons are kept continuously free from
all bacteria and waste food products
by flushing and irrigating the colonies
with fresh fluid. they would become ex-
tinct after few generations. Follow
ing this suggestion, one of DR.. Jen-
nings' colleagues carried these small
animals through 2.500 generations Prof.
Jennings has not only succeeded in
keeping his animals alive longer but
has gone even further in a public state
ment "Old age and death" he says.
has no necessary place in the life of
these creatures"
True enough, Prof. Jennings has not
gone radically to the public point of
saying that :old age and death have no
necessary place in human life" His
revolutionary discoveries have not yet
indicated to his discreet and conserva-
tive intellect any such generalization.
To the questions is death and decay
a necessary accompaniment of Iife?'
DO life processes necessarily take such
a course that they must lead TO death?"
Prof Jennings unhesitatingly answers:
My work on the paramecium answers
emphatically no. These animals-and
possibly all animals. including man
have the inherent power to perpetuate
themselves indefinitely. Prof. Weisman,