610 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 45. 



world from that source, must be directly or 

 indirectly attributed to the inspiration of the 

 master for whom the Institute was founded. 

 The world's debt to Pasteur we cannot 

 estimate. His financial gifts we can realize, 

 when we remember that he saved the silk- 

 worm industry, that he taught the vintners 

 how to make wine, that he established 

 the fermentative industry the world over, 

 and that he gave to the agriculturists a 

 method of preventing anthrax, we can see 

 that the financial value of his life to the 

 world was far beyond that of any other 

 person that ever lived. The debt of 

 theoretical science to him is equally 

 great, though not measurable in any terms. 

 He disclosed a new world; he discovered a 

 new series of phenomena taking place be- 

 low the realm of human vision and he opened 

 to the world a new field of science. To 

 medicine again his gifts were beyond meas- 

 ure. To him more than any other is 

 due the demonstration of the germ nature 

 of disease, and to his work we owe our 

 hopes for medical science in the future. 

 The practice of medicine has been almost 

 purely empirical. To-day we are hoping that 

 it is gradually becoming a matter of sci- 

 ence. As we know the causes so we can 

 search for the remedies against disease, and 

 to Pasteur is due the first attempt to place 

 medicine upon a scientific basis. Surgery 

 has already become a science, and this too 

 is indirectly attributable to him. While 

 modern surgical methods were developed 

 by Lister, the methods of Lister were de- 

 vised as the result of the study of Pasteur's 

 work in fermentation. Pasteur has opened 

 to us a new world and given to us a new sci- 

 ence, has established upon a firm basis a 

 science of medicine and a science of surgerj^, 

 and has added to the financial stores of the 

 world accumulations of great magnitude. 

 It was all done by slow work. The field 

 was not a new one, for already investi- 

 gators had made inroads therein, but no 



one with anything like certainty and ac- 

 curacy. For years it was Pasteur alone 

 who was capable of investigating bacte- 

 riologically with anything like a certainty 

 of successful issues. Bacteriological meth- 

 ods were too difiicult to be handled by 

 anyiihing but a master. To-day it is true 

 the methods have been so simplified that 

 far less genius is required to handle them, 

 and to-day the bacteriologist has multiplied 

 in every direction. But at the time when 

 Pasteur was the pioneer the methods were 

 so difiicult as to be beyond the reach of any 

 except those of the greatest genius. Nor 

 can we measure our debt to Pasteur by his 

 own work. This, iudeed, was great, but our 

 debt to him must be also measured by the 

 work of followers who were inspired by 

 him. In France, in England, in Germany, 

 in America, we find the study into this 

 realm of the microscope inspired by the 

 long, laborious and successful work of the 

 French master. Even in the latest achieve- 

 ment, the use of antitoxine, we have the 

 direct result of Pasteur's life. Where one 

 leads others may follow. For a long time 

 Pasteur stood alone, and it was only work 

 that he had done that could be looked upon 

 as demonstrated. Little by little, however, 

 others came into the line of research, and 

 when to-day Pasteur is taken from the 

 field of activity there are many capable of 

 cari'jang on his work. No man that France 

 has created is so worthy of her pride. No 

 man who has lived in history has done so 

 much for humanity. ISTo one who has lived 

 will be remembered by posterity as having 

 had such an influence upon the world in 

 the way of discovering facts which advance 

 the health and prosperity of mankind. 

 But, perhaps, the proudest achievement he 

 attained, viewed from the standpoint of a 

 scientist, was earning the right to the claim 

 that ^Pasteur never makes mistakes.' 



H. W. Conn. 



Wesleyan Univeesity. 



