OF ARTS AND SCIENCES. 339 



for some time in Broussais' wards, justly thinking that he would he 

 better able to understand those doctrines if he heard them from the 

 master's own lips. Broussais' scorn of the results of ancient medicine 

 met with a cordial response from Louis. But the substitution of still 

 another theory, instead of the results derived from well-observed and 

 minutely recorded facts, was wholly contrary to Louis' severe ideas, his 

 he so in de la verite* 



This method of investigating medical subjects being very different 

 from that pursued by Broussais, Louis, from the very necessities of 

 his nature, soon became one of the most formidable opponents of the 

 whole theoretical school of medicine. Violent attacks were made upon 

 him by the seemingly all-conquering Broussais. In order to make up 

 his mind more definitely, and although already thirty-four years old, 

 Louis decided to resign medical practice, and to devote himself for a 

 certain number of years to the unbiassed observation of disease. 



This he did for six years, in the wards of his friend Chomel, at that 

 time Professor of Clinical Medicine at La Charite. 



He spent from three to five houi's each day at the hospit-al. At 

 least two hours were occupied in making each autopsy. He examined 

 every organ in every dead body, even if no symptoms had been con- 

 nected with those organs so examined. " The two wards of the hos- 

 pital, the autopsy-room, and the small apartment in the entresol of the 

 hospital which were granted to him by the authorities, were all Paris 

 to him." " He became a true scientific cenobite." f " As such, he was 

 often exposed to expressions of surprise and pity from students and 

 physicians, so that it required some courage to meet them with perfect 

 equanimity." In this way he recorded accurately, by the bedside and 

 in the autopsy -room, two* thousand observations. Out of these he 

 began, at the request of his friend Chomel, to jniblish in 1823-4 

 certain memoirs and monographs. Two years afterward, 1825, he 

 printed his important work on Phthisis. This obtained for him a 

 place in the Academy of Medicine, and fame throughout the civilized 

 world. In 1826 his researches on Typhoid Fever were put forth. In 

 the preface he replied to his critics by quoting Descartes's remark " that 



* In the latter part of his life he gave as an autograph the following : — 

 " II y a quelque chose de plus rare que Tesprit de discerneraent. C'est le besoin 

 de la verite ; cet dtat de Tame qui ne nous permets pas de nous arreter dans lea 

 travaux scientifiques a ce qm n'est que vraisemblable et nous oblige a continuer 

 nos recherches jusqu'a ce que nous soyons arrives a I'evidence." 



t Dr. Louis, Sa Vie, ses (Euvres, par E. Weillet, membre de I'Academie. 

 Paris, 1873. 



