346 THE HISTORY OF BIOLOGY 



principle does not coincide with the conscious psychical life; it is rather a 

 kind of general force, which contains within itself irritability, sensibility, and 

 the other vital phenomena described by physiologists of that period. This 

 speculative tendency, it appears, follows a line of thought exactly opposed to 

 that which Bordeu pursued; he tried to regard the vital manifestations of the 

 different organs as isolated phenomena, while Barthez sought above all for 

 one common principle that would hold good for all manifestations of life. 



These and other members of the Montpellier school during the eighteenth 

 century would, however, scarcely deserve mention beyond the borders of 

 France had not their work formed the basis on which Bichat built further. 

 Marie pRANgois Xavier Bichat was born in 1771 at Jura, in eastern France. 

 His father was a doctor of repute, and the son was from early youth destined 

 for the same profession; after finishing school he studied surgery at a hospital 

 at Lyons, but when that city was destroyed during the wars of the Revolu- 

 tion, he betook himself to Paris. There he found a patron in the surgeon 

 Desault, with whom he worked both as a surgeon and as an anatomist. After 

 the death of his benefactor, in 1795, he spent a couple of years editing his 

 writings; in return he found in Desault 's widow a maternal friend and a 

 practical adviser. Bichat displayed throughout his short life an enthusiasm 

 for science that has hardly ever been equalled; although he lived through the 

 most exciting events of the French Revolution that occurred in his immediate 

 neighbourhood, he was nevertheless able to devote himself entirely to his 

 anatomical works. He spent his days and quite often his nights in the ana- 

 tomical theatre, in order not to waste time. Nor did he care much about 

 promotion; in 1797, however, he began to give lectures and four years later 

 was appointed to a professorial chair, without having applied for it. More- 

 over, he carried on very intensive work as an author and took part whole- 

 heartedly in the life of the medical faculty. In the spring of i8oi, however, 

 he was attacked by a malignant fever — whether as a result of septic poison- 

 ing or whether owing to some other infection is apparently not known — 

 and he died in spite of the utmost care of his friends and colleagues; at the 

 time of his death he had not yet reached his thirty-first year. 



Bichat' s character is described by his contemporaries as mild, modest, 

 and unselfish. His writings testify to a general knowledge that was surpris- 

 ingly extensive for such a young and extremely busy man, and yet his is the 

 work by no means of an unpractical bookworm, but of one who took a deep 

 interest in life and also observed a great deal in his fellow men. His works 

 were written during the last four years of his life; in the early maturity of 

 his creative powers he resembled Linnreus, as also in the fact that his genius 

 was primarily formal and systematic. Bichat has introduced a new system 

 into the science of anatomy and it is in this fact that his chief greatness lies. 



In his writings Bichat shows himself above all a medical man; the func- 



