If there were no pre-natal weaknesses, no transmitted blood poisons nor hereditary tendencies; if there were no sudden climatic changes; if there were no violations of the physical, mental and moral laws of God, medicines would be quite unnecessary. But as rational, practical men, we must take human beings precisely as we find them; and we find many of them wretchedly begotten, badly cared for in infancy, unwisely trained in childhood, wickedly tempted in youth, and in manhood frequently exposed to winds, pelting storms and the low malarial lands of the Western prairies. Thus conditioned, human ills: aches and pains and diseases are absolutely unavoidable, and, accordingly, remedies - medicinal remedies - carefully selected and wisely administered are positive necessities.

Medicines are not necessarily poisons. Water, as well as hydrastis, or phosphoric acid, may be administered medicinally.

Often the best answer a physician can give a patient who, with a gloomy look and a dolorous tone, asks, "What shall I do? is "Go to work; think less of yourself and more of others." Idlers are generally peevish, fretful and nervous.

Persons with weak eyes should not read or write when the stomach is empty. Literary men should have early breakfasts.

Half a teaspoonful of capsicum taken in a little milk immediately after eating, is infinitely better for the human stomach than "tonic drops," or any patent "bitters" ever swallowed.

Deep-seated consumption, with scrofulous diathesis, is incurable; but a cough is no proof of consumption. There are many different kinds of cough. "Sometimes the exciting cause of a cough lies not in the lungs and respiratory organs, but in the stomach, liver or intestines. In other cases there seems to be no real cause; it is purely nervous or hysterical."

A very common cough is the dry cough without expectoration; there is a short, hacking cough resulting from slight irritation, and the violent, spasmodic and convulsive cough caused by irritation or inflammation in the bronchial tubes; hoarse wheezing and shrill coughs indicate irritation of the windpipe. The hollow cough owes its peculiar sound to resonance in the enlarged tubes or the cavities in the lungs, Each cough requires a different treatment, which must be varied according to its cause.

For an ordinary cough the following is a superior mixture:

Muriate of Ammonia, 1 oz.

Pulverized Liquorice, 1 oz.

White Sugar, 4 ozs.

Boiling Water, 8 oz.

Mix and stir until it dissolves. Dose: a teaspoonful several times a day.

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This is also excellent:

Coxe's Hive Syrup, 2 oz.

Wine of Ipecac, 2 oz.

Oil of Wintergreen, 1 drachm. Mix.

Dose: a teaspoonful at a time.

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Here is a mixture which I have found very efficacious in one of the most common coughs. Take of

Fluid Extract of Jamaica Dogwood, 1-2 oz.

Diluted Sulphuric Acid, 80 minims.

Spirit of Chloroform, 2 drachms.

Hydrocyanic Acid, 16 minims.

Tincture of Sanguinaria, 1 oz.

Simple Syrup, a sufficient quantity to make a 4-ounce mixture. Keep well corked, and take a teaspoonful several times a day.

Disease is both a condition and an entity. As a condition it may be considered on the one hand as obstruction, inharmony between the vital and chemical forces, disturbed action of the nervo-vital principle, tending to structural disorganization. On the other hand, disease is an entity related to germs, bacteria, fungi, mould, miasma, sporules, entozoa, baecillus, with all kinds of poisonous exhalations from dark cellars, cisterns, cesspools, ponds, marshes, filthy streets, ill-ventilated rooms and dismal swamps.

These germs, bacteria and microscopic spores floating in the air, especially bad air, lodge upon the mucus linings of the nasal organs or find their way into the blood by the law of endosmose and exosmose, producing blood-poison, inflammation and death. If these floating bacteria lodge upon the mucus lining of the nasal organs they there rest, and if the vitality of the system is low they literally there hatch, producing living parasites, and these cause irritation and inflammation, as in catarrh, hay fever, bronchial difficulties and, in the end, consumption.

Prof. Huxley says that "bacteria are just as much plants as mushrooms or cabbages." The yeast plant belongs to this class. They are the essential agents in all fermentations, decompositions and putrefactions. The black vomit of Vera Cruz is caused by these fungi and spores. The cholera is produced by another, and diphtheria by still another. Some of these parasites are vegetable; others, as trichinae, are allied to insects and animals. These breed in, live upon and, ultimately, so disease the human body as to produce death.

But very few local physicians have as yet made the "germ theory" of disease a study, and the few who have do not know how to effectually disinfect the human body and destroy these parasites. The human system may be "just as well disinfected," says Prof. William Paine, "as a cellar or an old ship."

Through the patient microscopic investigation and the laborious experiments of such men as Eendus, Bazin, Schmidts, Kobner, Yogel, Cohn, Burdon-Sanderson, Pasteur, Dr. Robert Koch and others, it has been demonstrated that infectious and contagious diseases are produced by parasitic fungi and bacteria germs. Only last year Prof. Koch, in Cairo, at the head of the German commission, discovered the cholera parasite in the intestines. He has also discovered and studied the nature of the parasite which produces consumption, a disease that destroys one-sixth of all who die between the ages of 18 and 45 years. These germs, or living parasites, cause chills and fever, typhus fever, remittent fever, yellow fever, erysipelas, scarlitina, rheumatism, dropsy, cholera, catarrh, bronchitis, pneumonia and consumption.

To meet these difficulties physicians are turning their attention to iodine, tar, sulphurous acid, carbolic acid, phenic acid, and similar disinfectants.