November 28, 1901J 



NA TURE 



front of which the President was seated, is a large fresco 

 representing Arts and Science ; and round the amphi- 

 theatre there are niches containing busts of Robert de 

 Sorbon, the founder of the Sorbonne, or University of 

 Paris ; of RicheHeu, Pascal, Descartes, Lavoisier and 

 Rollin — the elite of the Frenchmen who have exercised 

 influence on French education and on arts and sciences. 

 On the right of the President the band of the Garde 

 RepubHcaine welcomed him with the Marseillaise, the 

 audience all standing, and the proceedings began punc- 

 tually at 10 a.m. They were opened by a discourse 

 from the Ministre de I'Instruction publique, M. Leygues, 

 who gave an impassioned address on the services which 

 M. Berthelot had rendered to French education , he 

 noted how the ubiquity of M. Berthelot's genius had led 

 him to pay attention, not merely to scientific work, but 

 also to extend his purview to the systems pursued in 

 schools and to the primary and secondary education of 

 French citizens. ^I. Darboux, secretaire perpetuel of 

 the Academy of Sciences, in a careful and well-delivered 

 address, alluded specially to M. Berthelot's contributions 

 to general science and to the recognition of his labours, 

 testified by the international response to requests for sub- 

 scriptions, and to the numerous societies and associations 

 which had presented him with addresses. M. Darboux 

 was succeeded by M. Fouque, president of the .Academy 

 of Sciences, who echoed what M. Darboux had said 

 and expressed the gratification of the Academy that one 

 of its members, who had devoted his life to the pursuit 

 of truth for its own sake, had, in receiving respect and 

 recognition from the whole civilised world, conferred 

 honour on the body of which he had so long been a 

 member, and whose proceedings he had enriched by so 

 many valuable contributions. 



M. Moissan, now professor of chemistry at the Sor- 

 bonne, gave in his address an account in genera! terms 

 of M. Berthelot's contributions to chemical science. As 

 early as 1855 Berthelot's work on sugar, which led to 

 the synthesis of formic acid and of alcohol, directed the 

 attention of chemists, who had formerly regarded analysis 

 as the chief aim and end of chemical work, to synthesis. 

 Although the idea of a "vital force" had been attacked 

 by Wohler and Liebig, still Berthelot, by numerous 

 brilliant syntheses, contributed more than anyone, 

 during the decade 1855-65, to render the idea untenable. 

 In this he was helped by his friends Pasteur and Claude 

 Bernard, each of whom, at the later date, was laying the 

 foundations of the work which rendered his riame 

 immortal. M. Moissan aptly remarked, in alluding to 

 " vital force," " nous avons d'autant plus de theories que 

 la chose est moins claire." Sketching rapidly Berthelot's 

 work on acetylene, on explosives, on thermochemistry, 

 on the absorption of nitrogen by plants, and his con- 

 tributions to chemical history, he having translated and 

 edited numerous Greek and Arabic writers on the sub- 

 ject, he concluded by the remark that, owing to the 

 universality of his knowledge and attainments, M. 

 Berthelot must be regarded as the last of the "encyclo- 

 paedists." The address was concluded by the phrase, 

 " Nous vous remercions pour nous avoir donne un peu 

 plus de la verite." 



M. Gaston Paris, one of the executive of the College 

 de France, was the next speaker. He alluded to the 

 long connection which had subsisted between M. Ber- 

 thelot and the College de France. In 185 1 he was 

 recommended by Balard as deserving of the position of 

 his " preparateur," or assistant.. After eight years, 

 however, he migrated to the Ecole de Pharmacie, 

 where, in 1865, he was made " Professeur titule" of 

 organic chemistry. Shortly after, however, he was 

 recalled to his old home, the College de France, where 

 he has remained ever since, in spite of numerous calls to 

 accept more lucrative positions elsewhere. 



NO. 1674, VOL. 65J 



After a few words from the president of the Academy 

 of Medicine, Emil Fischer, the eminent professor of 

 chemistry of Berlin, read an address in German from the 

 Prussian Academy of Sciences, and at the same time pre- 

 sented one from the German Chemical Society ; Dr. J. H. 

 Gladstone followed, introducing first Prof Ramsay, who, 

 after a few prefatory remarks, read the address sent by 

 the Royal Society, and next Prof Emerson Reynolds, who 

 presented an address from the Chemical Society, of which 

 he is president ; and lastly Dr. Gladstone handed in an ad- 

 dress from the Royal Institution. Prof. Lieben, of Vienna, 

 conveyed the congratulations of the Imperial Academy of 

 Vienna ; and Prof. Guareschi, those from the Academy of 

 Turin. M. Troost, the former professor at the Sorbonne, 

 read a list of academies and societies which had sent 

 congratulatory addresses, so numerous that nearly a 

 quarter of an hour was occupied by the mere recitation 

 of the names ; and concluded by reading a personal tele- 

 gram from the King of the Belgians, conveying His 

 Majesty's felicitations, and announcing that the Queen 

 Regent of Spain had conferred on M. Berthelot the 

 Grand Cordon of the Order of Charles III. 



The following translation of M. Berthelot's speech in 

 acknowledgment of the tribute to his genius and 

 scientific work is from Monday's Times : — 



I am deeply touched and really embarrassed by the homage 

 which you are offering me to-day. These honours, I am aware, 

 are not due merely to your affection for my person, I must 

 attribute them also to my age, my long labours, and to cert.-iin 

 services which I have been able to render to our Fatherland and 

 to my fellow men. Your sympathy makes the lamp which is 

 about to be extinguished in the everlasting night shine with a 

 final brilliancy. The respect of humanity for old men is the 

 expression of the solidarity uniting present generations with 

 those that have preceded us and with those that are to follow. 

 What we are, in fact, is only to a very slight degree attributable 

 to our personal labour and individuality. We owe it almost 

 entirely to our ancestors, ancestors by blood and our spiritual 

 ancestors. If each of us adds something to the common domain 

 in the field of science, of art, of morality; it is because a long 

 series of generations have lived, worked, thought and suffered 

 before us. It is the patient labours of our predecessors who 

 created the science that you are honouring to-day. Each of us, 

 whatever his individual initiative, must also attribute a consider- 

 able portion of his success to contemporary savants concurring 

 with him in the great common task. In fact, no one — let us 

 proclaim it loudly — no one has the right to lay exclusive claim 

 to any of the brilliant discoveries of the past century. Science 

 is essentially a collective work, prosecuted during the course of 

 time by the efforts of a multitude of workers of all ages and 

 every nation succeeding one another and associated by a tacit 

 understanding for the search of pure truth, and for the applica- 

 tion of this truth to the continuous transformation of the 

 condition of all men. 



Of yore savants were looked upon as a little group of amateurs 

 and men of leisure maintained at the charge of the working 

 classes, and executing a task of luxury and pure curiosity for 

 the amusement and distraction of those favoured by fortune. 

 This narrow and unjust view which paid so little heed to our 

 devotion to the truth and our services, this prejudice, finally 

 disappeared when the development of science showed that the 

 laws of nature were applicable to the practice of industries, 

 and had as a consequence the substitution for the old tradi- 

 tional and empirical receipts of the profitable rules of the 

 theories based on observation and experience. To-day who 

 would venture to regard science as a sterile amusement in pre- 

 sence of the general increase of national and private wealth 

 which results therefrom ? To confine ourselves to mentioning 

 the most interesting perhaps of the services which science has 

 rendered, it suffices to compare the servile and miserable con- 

 dition of the popular classes in the past as revealed to us by 

 historical documents with their condition at present, already so 

 advanced in dignity and well-being without counting the just 

 hopes of which they are pursuing the realisation. Is there a 

 statesman who doubts the services, greater still, which are to 

 be looked for as the result of this incessant progress ? Science 



