53o 
The  Writing  of  a  Thesis. 
(Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\  November,  1902. 
unknown  mazes.  The  result  is  that  more  chemical  facts  have  been 
brought  to  light  in  one  week,  in  chemistry,  in  Germany,  than  in  a 
year  in  most  other  countries.  Independently  entirely  of  the  benefit 
to  science  and  the  world  at  large  that  each  and  every  such  fact 
entails,  there  is  the  engendered  delight,  enthusiasm  and  pleasure 
that  follows  the  discovery  of  something  new.  No  one  who  has  ever 
discovered  a  new  substance,  method  or  fact  can  realize  the  innate 
delight  which  such  a  discovery  produces  in  the  discoverer ;  and  with 
this  delight  there  follows  also  the  desire  to  discover  more  facts, 
work  out  more  problems,  benefit  mankind  by  more  discoveries. 
This  pleasure  cannot  be  described;  it  must  be  felt  to  be  appreciated. 
If  you  will  read  the  life  or  the  correspondence  of  any  of  the  great 
pioneers  in  the  domain  of  chemical  discovery,  you  will  have  engrafted 
into  your  brain,  aye,  into  your  very  bone  and  marrow,  some  of  this 
divine  fire  and  enthusiasm,  but  even  that  bears  only  a  slight  sem- 
blance to  the  genuine  delight  felt  upon  seeing  before  you  in  your 
test-tube,  beaker  or  flask  your  first-born  chemical  or  pharmaceutical 
child.  I  can  well  recall  my  own  experience  in  this  line  when,  dur- 
ing an  examination  of  that  sweet  substance,  saccharin,  which  had 
been  discovered  not  long  before  in  the  laboratory  where  I  worked, 
I  obtained  the  original  substance  of  which  it  is  a  derivative,  and 
which  had  never  been  seen  or  obtained  by  any  mortal  before. 
When,  in  addition  to  this,  on  the  succeeding  day — and  I  did  not  sleep 
much  during  that  memorable  night — I  succeeded  in  obtaining  the 
first  anhydrid  of  an  ortho-sulphocarbonic  acid,  a  substance  not  sup- 
posed to  be  obtainable  at  the  time,  my  cup  was  full  to  overflowing, 
and  I  would  not  have  exchanged  places  with  a  king.  I  can  well 
remember  the  exultant  and  beaming  countenance  of  my  teacher 
when  together  he  and  I  held  in  our  hand  the  beautifully  crystalline 
rhombohedra  of  that  anhydrid.  Even  though  he  had  in  his  ex- 
perience seen  the  birth  of  many  and  many  a  hundred  substances, 
still  the  pleasure  of  this  additional  discovery  was  probably  as  great 
as  any  of  the  others,  notably  because  it  was  so  unexpected.  While 
every  one  cannot  be  a  Liebig,  a  Hofmann  or  a  Remsen,  still,  every 
one  can  add  his  little  mite  to  help  develop  the  great  science  in 
which  we  are  all  interested.  When  you  are  going  to  write  your 
thesis — and  of  course  all  of  you  who  are  students  will  do  so — bear  in 
mind  the  fact  that  what  is  worth  doing  is  worth  doing  well ;  and  the 
way  to  do  a  thesis  well  is  to  make  it  leave  its  impress  upon  the 
