230 PASTEUR: THE HISTORY OF A MIND 



castoro and Linnaeus, who have outstripped their epoch 

 by showing with more and more precision the evident 

 analogies between the phenomena of fermentation and 

 of diseases, and who have more or less suspected living 

 organisms in diseases in proportion as they appeared in 

 fermentations. But it is not in these multicolored 

 big lanterns moving about in the night that we are to 

 see the dawn of our present ideas. 



II 



CAUSES OF THE STERILITY OF THE IDEAS UPON 

 CONTAGION 



Such being the case, what one has the right to ask is 

 why these ideas did not attract the attention of con- 

 temporaries to a greater extent. Why have systems as 

 suggestive as those of Henle, of Hameau, remained 

 unknown or disdained? We shall here find the secret 

 of their weakness. It is because they were works of 

 the closet and because not being developed from experi- 

 ment, they did not end in experiment. Systematic 

 and brilliant minds have never been wanting in medi- 

 cine. When Hameau was writing, Broussais was still 

 alive: the cloud of dust which he had raised, and in the 

 midst of which his disciples were felicitating themselves, 

 was too thick for the vague light of the little physician 

 of La Teste, who explained very well certain known 

 facts, but did not point out new pathways. 



In 1840, at the moment of the appearance of the mem- 

 oir of Henle, the German physicians had, on their side, 

 better excuses than those of to-day for not paying atten- 

 tion to these new ideas. They were too much in oppo- 

 sition to the strong and fertile conceptions that Vir- 

 chow was introducing at this time into the science. 



