276 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



This apparent digression brings us face to face 

 with the labours of a man who combines the penetration 

 of the true theorist with the skill and conscientiousness 

 of the true experimenter, and whose practice is one 

 continued demonstration of the theory that the putre- 

 faction of wounds is to be averted by the destruction 

 of the germs of bacteria. Not only from his own 

 reports of his cases, but from the reports of eminent 

 men who have visited his hospital, and from the 

 opinions expressed to me by continental surgeons, do 

 I gather that one of the greatest steps ever made in 

 the art of surgery was the introduction of the anti- 

 septic system of treatment, introduced by Professor 

 Lister. 



The interest of this subject does not slacken as we 

 proceed. We began with the cherry-cask and beer- 

 vat ; we end with the body of man. There are persons 

 born with the power of interpreting natural facts, as 

 there are others smitten with everlasting incompetence 

 in regard to such interpretation. To the former class 

 in an eminent degree belonged the illustrious philo- 

 sopher Robert Boyle, whose words in relation to this 

 subject have in them the forecast of prophecy. 'And 

 let me add,' writes Boyle in his ' Essay on the Patho- 

 logical Part of Physik,' ' that he that thoroughly under- 

 stands the nature of ferments and fermentations shall 

 probably be much better able than he that ignores 

 them, to give a fair account of divers phenomena of 

 several diseases (as well fevers as others), which will 

 perhaps be never properly understood without an insight 

 into the doctrine of fermentations.' 



Two hundred years have passed since these preg- 

 nant words were written, and it is only in this our day 

 that men are beginning to fully realise their truth. In 

 the domain of surgery the justice of Boyle's surmise 



