
EXAMINATION OF PASTEUR’S DOCTRINES 123 
_ and were not found after they had been heated to 
the higher temperature. 
He actually did not mention the other possibility, 
or attempt to adduce any direct and positive 
evidence in favour of his own view. Yet he might 
be supposed to have known such facts as are 
mentioned by Gerhardt in the quotation at the 
commencement of this chapter ; and he could scarcely 
fail to have seen that besides the mere difference in 
temperature as a cause of the different results with the 
same fluid, there was the possible influence of the 
mere slight acidity or alkalinity of the fluids in 
producing opposite results when the different fluids 
were heated to 100° C. How easy would it have 
been to test the reality of this latter difference in the 
ways I have indicated, which show plainly enough 
that neutral or slightly alkaline infusions are the 
most favourable for the mere growth and develop- 
ment of Bacteria, and therefore mzght be more 
favourable also for Archebiosis. Origination and 
growth are, after all, possibly not so very different. 
But not a word was said by Pasteur on this 
subject, nor was anything done by him to throw 
light upon the question. In fact he absolutely 
ignored the existence of one of the two possible 
interpretations of the problem under discussion. To 
come to the conclusion which he did, in face of 
what was previously known and assented to by 
himself as to the destructive influence of 100° C. 
upon living matter immersed in fluids was, of 
course, absolutely unwarrantable. It will perhaps 
scarcely be credited by many that these particular 
