Highlights in the History of Microbiology 11 



drained off most, if not all, of his spare time. He is reported to 

 have constructed 247 complete microscopes with magnifying 

 powers of from 40 to 270 diameters. These might more accurately 

 be described as simple lenses rather than microscopes. Some 419 

 individual lenses are credited to his patient grinding activities 

 during his lifetime. 



Leeuwenhoek's neighbors did not look kindly on the strange 

 things to which Antony devoted his energies. But Leeuwenhoek, 

 the only man in Holland who knew how to grind pieces of clear 

 rock crystal in such a way as to magnify objects too small to be 

 seen with the naked eye, actually felt sorry for his neighbors 

 and once made the statement: "We must forgive them, seeing that 

 they know no better." Science has not always been a respectable 

 profession, and much laboratory work was conducted behind closed 

 doors. After all, had not Galileo been imprisoned because he 

 dared to sugsiest that the earth moved around the sun? Burning 

 at the stake was the price paid by some who ventured to cut 

 up a human body in an attempt to discover what made it function. 



Learned men of this interesting era spoke Latin, but poor 

 Leeuwenhoek could only read the Dutch Bible. He was a religious 

 man and referred to God as the Maker of the Great All. Because 

 of his relative ignorance, Antony was not fettered with a great 

 deal of nonsense subscribed to bv the so-called learned professions. 

 He built up his storehouse of knowledge by employing the 

 scientific method, unbiased by the printed word which was so 

 often based upon fallacy and not upon fact. A half-dozen observa- 

 tions of a given reaction were not sufficient for Leeuwenhoek be- 

 fore he put his findings in writing. Each experiment had to be 

 repeated hundreds of times to eliminate any chance misconception 

 of what had taken place. However, once he felt that he could 

 record his observations, strong-willed Leeuwenhoek could be 

 swayed by no one. Many writings describe the man as being 

 strongly opinionated; perhaps he had every justification for being 

 so sure of himself. Who among these Latin speaking scholars had 

 soiled his hands by working tediously in poorly lighted labora- 

 tories to squeeze out one scientific fact from the secrets to be 



