Warmth, moisture, food -- these are the causes that activate latent germs and arouse them
to activity. They exist, all except the food, in the mouth, nose and throat at all times. The
food is thrown out into these, as excretions, in disease. The germs feed on the excretions.
They are scavengers. They were never anything else and will never be anything else. They
break up and consume the discharge from the tissues. This is the function ascribed
to germs everywhere in nature outside the body and is their real and only function in
disease. They are purifying and beneficial agents.
The medical profession has worked itself into hysteria over the germ theory and is using it
to exploit an all too credulous public. Germs are ubiquitous. They are in the air we
breathe, the food we eat, the water we drink. We cannot escape them. We can destroy
them only to a limited extent. It is folly to attempt to escape disease by attempting to
destroy or escape germs. Once they are in the body, the physician has no means of
destroying them that will not, at the same time, destroy the patient. We cannot avoid
germs. We must be proof against them. We have to accept them as one of the joys of life."