Paul Ehrlich. 



vH 



In a notice such as this it is impossible to do justice to many of Ehrlich's 

 investigations ;* his extraordinary industry is indicated by the several 

 hundred papers which he published. We have selected only the main 

 subjects, and have endeavoured to show their dependence on a common 

 principle. Of his originality, of the extent and quality of his work, and of 

 the practical results obtained, there can be, we think, only one opinion : they 

 are all of the first order. From the outset he marked off a field of work 

 for himself, and this was not confined to any one science, but encroached on 

 the domain of several. A worker in biology, he called to his aid the services 

 of chemistry, and his knowledge of both departments was immense. To 

 what extent his application of purely chemical conceptions to certain vital 

 processes was justified is a question which can be answered only in the 

 future, but this does not affect the value of the actual attainments by his 

 methods. Originality and boldness of conception are apparent in his earliest 

 researches, and, as we have already indicated, his whole life's work is an 

 evolution from these. His outlook was never utilitarian : " Science for its 

 own sake " might have been his motto, and the practical fruits fell off inci- 

 dentally, as it were. With remarkable imaginative power there was combined 

 in equal degree the faculty of intensive work, and each problem was worked 

 out by him down to minute details. The researches, guided by his master 

 mind, which led up to the discovery of salvarsan, stand in a sense by them- 

 selves in the history of medical science. He saw that scientific investigations 

 in certain departments must nowadays be " on a Dreadnought scale," as he 

 himself put it in one of his characteristic phrases, and fortunately the great 

 requirements of his later work were satisfied and success was attained. And 

 apart from Ehrlich's actual discoveries, it must be recognised that at the 

 beginning of the century there was no more potent and far-reaching 

 influence than his in the domain of medical science. 



E. M. 



* A full account and analysis of his work are given in the volume " Paul Ehrlich," 

 a Festschrift published on the occasion of his 60th birthday in 1914. 



