124 THE LIFE OF PASTEUR 



Sciences, Sainte Beuve was asked to help that of a young 

 friend of his, Charles Robin. Robin occupied a professor's 

 chair specially created for him at the Faculte de Medecine ; he 

 had made a deep microscopical study of the tissues of living 

 bodies, of cellular life, of all which constitutes histology. He 

 was convinced that outside his own studies, numerous ques- 

 tions would fall more and more into the domain of experimenta- 

 tion, and he believed that the faith in spiritual things could 

 not " stand the struggle against the spirit of the times, wholly 

 turned to positive things." He did not, like Pasteur, under- 

 stand the clear distinction between the scientist on the one 

 hand and the man of sentiment on the other, each absolutely 

 independent. Neither did he imitate the reserve of Claude 

 Bernard who did not allow himself to be pressed by any 

 urgent questioner into enrolment with either the believers or 

 the unbelievers, but answered: "When I am in my labora- 

 tory, I begin by shutting the door on materialism and on 

 spiritualism ; I observe facts alone ; I seek but the scientific 

 conditions under which life manifests itself." Robin was a 

 disciple of Auguste Comte, and proclaimed himself a Positivist, 

 a word which for superficial people was the equivalent of 

 materialist. The same efforts which had succeeded in keeping 

 Littre out of the Academie Francaise in 1863 were now 

 attempted in order to keep Robin out of the Academie des 

 Sciences in 1865. 



Sainte Beuve, whilst studying medicine, had been a Posi- 

 tivist ; his quick and impressionable nature had then turned to 

 a mysticism which had inspired him to pen some fine verses. 

 He had now returned to his former philosophy, but kept an 

 open mind, however, criticism being for him not the art of 

 dictating, but of understanding, and he was absolutely averse 

 to irrelevant considerations when a candidature was in question. 



The best means with Pasteur, who was no diplomat, was to 



go straight to the point. Sainte Beuve therefore wrote to him : 



' Bear Sir, will you allow me to be indiscreet enough to solicit 



your influence in favour of M. Robin, whose work I know you 



appreciate? 



" M. Robin does not perhaps belong to the same philo- 

 sophical school as you do ; but it seems to me — from an out- 

 sider's point of view — that he belongs to the same scientific 

 school. If he should differ essentially — whether in meta- 

 physics or otherwise — would it not be worthy of a great scientist 



