290 LOUIS PASTEUR. 



which an obscure problem had for him, he felt that if 

 he succeeded in discovering the probably microbean 

 etiology of such a disease, he would carry all minds 

 with him into the current of these new ideas. He had 

 been very often struck, if not with the opposition, at 

 least with the prudent and circumspect reserve, shown 

 in the examination of his doctrine, by a considerable 

 number of physicians who, possessed by the idea that 

 the moral element could cause modifications in the 

 symptoms and development of a malady in man, are 

 not disposed to recognise the least assimilation between 

 human diseases and those of the animal species. No 

 doubt the emotional qualities, grave family cares, the 

 terror of approaching death, the dread of the great un- 

 known, may modify the course of the evil in man, may 

 aggravate it, even hasten it ; but, whilst recognising 

 for never was there a man more a creature of senti- 

 ment than he what there is of deep truth in this 

 opinion, Pasteur could not help thinking that the first 

 origin, the cause of every contagious malady, is physio- 

 logically the same in the two groups, and that our 

 bodies, notwithstanding our superior moral qualities, 

 are exposed to the same dangers, to the same disorders, 

 as the bodies of animals. 



To overcome these resistances, it was necessary, as 

 in the great experiments on splenic fever, to attack a 

 disease common both to men and animals one in 

 which experimentation, the only, but great, strength 



