2 THE ENZYME TREATMENT OF CANCER
nature,
were not evidences to those, who knew nothing at all of modern embryology or of
stereo-chemistry, and who relied implicitly upon the microscopical examination
and appearances of a portion of the growth taken before or after operation.
Then there were the countless failures,* many of them due, as I am now
convinced, to faulty preparations, or to injections which were very much too
weak for their work. In this way great difficulties had to be surmounted,
quite apart from what has been termed the “ conservatism” of the medical profession.
Apart from the latter, these difficulties seem now to have been removed.
Definite statements can be made concerning the requirements of really
efficacious preparations for the treatment, and a successful case of cure, not
standing isolated, can be, and is, produced in the present writing.
* For the sake of
scientific truth, the published opinion of Professor F. Blumenthal, of the
University of Berlin—certainly a competent judge—regarding these should be
noted. The vast majority of the cases hitherto treated (usually with very weak
injections and with small doses of these) were in an advanced phase of cancer.
Oftener than not they were some of the failures of surgery. Professor Blumenthal
remarks—rightly and scientifically—that the cases as yet handed over for
medical treatment, as opposed to surgical, were nearly all such that no
possible treatment could have saved them. Lost this should be supposed to be
exaggerated, Professor Blumenthal’s actual words may be cited. He writes “Die
innere Behandlung des Carcinoms ist heute lediglich beschrãnkt auf die
verzweifelten, nicht operablen FälIe. Wir haben jetzt daran festzuhalten, dass
jede bösartige Geschwulst, so lange sie operabel ist, auch durch Operation
entfernt werden muss. Es hande]t sich also für die innere Behandlung urn eine
Katcgorie von Krankheitsfällen, welche vergleichbar sind mit verallgemoinerter
Tuberculose, disseminierter Eiterung. Man stellt an die innere Therapie die
Anforderung, nicht die beginnenden Fälle zu heilen, sondern überlässt
ihr fast niir solche Falls, die wohl niemals gerettet werden könnten, aitch
wenn es eine innere Methods gäbe.” Ferdinand Blumenthal, “Innere Behandlung und
Fursorge bei Krebskranken.” in Zeitschrift f. Krebsforschung, vol. x.,
pp. 134-148 (1910) loc. Cit.,
p. 134.