The evolution of morbid germs : a contribution to transcendental pathology / by Kenneth W. Millican.

  • Millican Kenneth W.
Date:
1883
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The evolution of morbid germs : a contribution to transcendental pathology / by Kenneth W. Millican. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    servation of Hippocrates, if it (febris recurrens ?) had existed then as it does now about the native plan of tjie great Askelpiad. If the correctness of this hypothesis be accepted, and the dependence of contagious diseases on an infection of the body from low organisms be regarded as certain, the appearance of new infectious diseases must seem a proof of the development of new species of organic beings. Should not the varied malignity shewn by epidemics of the same disease at different times, and certain peculiarities of the individual epidemics, be most simply referred to slight modifications, and the gradual passage of certain phases of infectious disease into other forms as extensive modifications of the low organisms ? That NiEMEYER here suggests that the Darwinian doctrine might be applicable to the original development of the specific infectious diseases, there can be no doubt. That he does not attempt to apply the doctrine is to my mind equally clear. But from the Evolutionist's point of view, even this passage appears strange when considered in the light of the following contradictory statements from the same editJbn :— I do not agree with most recent authors in considering the question settled in regard to whether Exanthematic Typhus be exclusively propagated by contagion, or if it be also due to miasm. There is no solid ground for such assertions as this, ' that a disease is either only miasmatic or only contagious,' and even the persons making them do not always strictly adhere to them.—Page 565. Compare with this the two following :— Measles is a purely contagious disease. There is no doubt that a person is never affected with Measles without having been infected by a person with measles.'—Tage 523. Relapsing fever is among the acute infections about whose propa