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THE LIBRARY

THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA

PRESENTED BY

PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND
MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID

TWELVE CATHOLIC MEN
OF SCIENCE

THOMAS LINACRE

TWELVE CATHOLIC
MEN OF SCIENCE

EDITED BY

SIR BERTRAM WINDLE,

M.D., Sc.D., F.R.S.

LONDON
CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY

69 SOUTH WARK BRIDGE ROAD, S.E.
1912

PREFACE

THE object of these biographies is to demonstrate the
fact, unknown apparently to many critics of the Church,
that there are numerous stars of science (and many more
than this series includes) who were also devout Catholics,
and found no difficulty in maintaining both positions
simultaneously. It ought to be superfluous to maintain
such a thesis, and it would be so if persons who
propagate such accusations as are made against the
Catholic Church would, first of all, investigate the facts
of the case. But, as the statement has been made, it
may be well to give some definite examples of the co-
existence in the same individual of scientific enthusiasm
and reputation with a steadfast attachment to the
doctrines of the Catholic Church.

As only a selection is possible, it has been thought
desirable that such selection should embrace a collection
of subjects as varied as possible. Hence the persons
whose lives are here sketched are taken from different
countries, from different ages, and from different
branches of science— biological and physical. Some —
e.g. Stensen, Secchi, and Mendel — were churchmen,
others were lay ; some spent their lives amongst
Catholic surroundings, others, like Dwight, lived largely

M363O91

vi Twelve Catholic Men of Science

in a non-Catholic environment. Most of them were born
in the Church, but some entered in later years — e.g.
Stensen and Dwight. Some lived in times when the
profession of their religion was at least no disadvantage,
others — e.g. Laennec and Pasteur — when it was either
a positive disadvantage or, at least, in no way in their
favour. In one thing only all are alike, and that is in
their attachment to their religion.

BERTRAM C. A. WINDLE.

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, CORK,
July 15, 1912.

CONTENTS

THOMAS LINACRE (1460-1524).

By J. P. PYE, M.D., D.Sc.

ANDREAS VESALIUS (1514-1564).

By JAMES J. WALSH, M.D., Ph.D., Sc.D.

NICOLAUS STENSEN (1638-1687).

By Sir BERTRAM WINDLE, M.D., Sc.D., F.R.S.

ALOISIO GALVANI (1737-1798).

By WILLIAM BERGIN, M.A., M.R.I. A.

RENE THEODORE LAENNEC (1781-1826).
By B. J. COLLINGWOOD, M.D.

JOHANNES MULLER (1801-1858).

By G. A. BOULENGER, D.Sc., Ph.D., F.R.S.

SIR DOMINIC CORRIGAN (1802-1880).

By Sir FRANCIS R. CRUISE, M.D., D.L., LL.D.

ANGELO SECCHI, SJ. (1818-1878).

By the Rev. A. L. CORTIE, S.J., F.R.A.S.

JOHANN GREGOR MENDEL (1822-1884).

By the Rev. G. A. ELRINGTON, O.P., D.Sc.,
F.L.S.

Louis PASTEUR (1822-1895).

By E. J. M'WEENEY, M.D., F.R.C.P.I.

ALBERT DE LAPPARENT (1839-1908).

By the Rev. JOHN GERARD, S.J., F.L.S.

THOMAS DWIGHT (1843-1911).

By Sir BERTRAM WINDLE, M.D., Sc.D., F.R.Sf

THOMAS LINACRE

SCHOLAR, PHYSICIAN, PRIEST
(1460-1524)

J. P. PYE, M.D., D.Sc.,

Professor of Anatomy and Physiology
in University College, Galway.

THE career open to the talents is supposed to date from
Napoleon's time, though not everybody is satisfied that
the way is open even now. " Educational ladders " up
which may be had, if not a particularly easy way, still
a way from any lower level to the highest place in the
State, are talked of. The elevating apparatus (it is held)
must include some arrangement for study abroad in the
shape of travelling subsidies, with a view to mental
expansion and uplifting under the influence of foreign
life and manners.

If that is the best that education can do (and Mr.
Ruskin held that Englishmen are constitutionally unfit
to do it), the people of the fifteenth century must be
allowed to have had some notion of what was good for
them. At least, they and their times did well for the boy
Thomas Linacre (Lynacre), born at Canterbury 1460
(tempore Henry VII.) ; educated at the monastery
school — parents obscure or unknown ; thence to Oxford,
Florence, Rome, Padua ; the first, or amongst the first,
of Renaissance scholars ; friend of Erasmus and More and
many others, great men in a great time — Wolsey, War-
ham, Colet ; held in high repute amongst Italian litterati
and princes — Lorenzo de' Medici and his son Pope Leo X.
1 I i

2 Thomas Linacre

All will recognize the truth of the statement that, amongst
the early Humanists, scholarship claimed a precedence
that has not been equalled since that day.

There are two remarks to be made before approaching
the facts of Linacre's life. For one thing, nobody denies
that the Church, since its foundation to the present hour,
has recognized that the calling to its ministry is in-
dependent of rank or position. But Linacre, though he
took priest's orders, did so late in life. He was over fifty
years of age and already a famous man when ordained.

Again, the policy of Henry VII. made preferment by
merit alone a comparatively common thing. The King
had much to do with the making of England. It was
to his interest to depress the power of the nobles — even
those by whose help he had risen ; the caprice of indivi-
dual leaders had often determined unexpected victory
in the Wars of the Roses. It was the policy of Richelieu
and of Charles V. Men of humble origin were sought
out and appointed chiefs of State, the efficiency thereby
secured strengthening the power of the Crown. The
process also strengthened the State, though, possibly,
the intention here was not so direct.

Last of all, and most worthy of being said, is this — that
the new class raised to power were conspicuous by their
liberality towards education. Linacre left his great
wealth — almost all of it — for public use. The gifts were
made during his lifetime. There was little left to dispose
of in his will (proved in 1525). We learn from small
bequests that he had a brother and sisters — almost all
we know of his family. These foundations of the fifteenth
and early sixteenth century endure — those of them that
passed the danger period of Henry VIII.'s Commissions ;
and their endurance is evidence of the good intentions
and sound judgement of the benefactors. Characteristic
of them, if not their dominant character, is the personal
relation set up between giver and recipient. The exist-
ence of a soul was emphasized — on that ground, at least,

Thomas Linacre 3

both parties stood equal — " Of what he had he could
give," and the prayer for the benefactor went far to
balance the account between the two parties.

To the same influence is due the democratic policy
that pervades the old foundations. All men were equal
for the purposes of these charitable trusts.

Linacre was a product of the early Italian Renais-
sance : there was free intercourse between Italy and
England in his time. William de Selling had introduced
Humanistic learning, in its new and attractive form ;
and at the monastery school of Christ Church, Canterbury,
where Selling taught (he was afterwards Prior), Linacre
came under his influence. The impress was never lost.
At Oxford (probably All Souls College, where Linacre
was elected Fellow in 1484) he came under the influence
of Vitelli, said to have been the first teacher of Greek in
England ; at Oxford, too, were Grocyn and Latimer. The
" atmosphere " could not be more " humanistic," and
the fervour that attends nascent culture more than made
up for the formalities of organized procedure. I am often
set wondering by the mass of regulations and statutes
modern universities think fit to set up when starting
house on their own account, as if rules could take the
place of men ! The " mortmain " of paper constitutions
is not a good substitute for living personal influence ;
worse than that, the paper formulas tend to oust the
influence of the living agents. I like to think of
Oxford at the close of the fifteenth century: then, as
now, a place to dream in, but where, as not now, the
student had the full enjoyment of the founders' inten-
tions. The college chapels, that to-day can only suggest
the purpose of the early benefactors, were then its living
embodiment.

In 1485 Selling went to Rome as ambassador from
Henry VII. to the Pope, and Linacre travelled in his
suite. The master did not forget his old pupil, and

4 Thomas Linacre

Linacre's popularity abroad, while due, in the main, to
personal qualities, must have owed something to Selling's
introductions. The universities at that time formed
a great guild of persons animated with a common purpose ;
no student was a stranger at any of them. The ' ' nations ' '
of mediaeval universities were a recognition of the cosmo-
politan character of their influence ; yet with the cosmo-
politan idea there was found a unifying influence derived
from a central authority. " In spite of national diver-
sities there existed all over Europe a striking unity of
spirit, of civilization, of learning and religious feeling,
diffused mainly by the Church, which from her centre
at Rome acted as the mainspring of mental cultivation
everywhere, and penetrated into the internal constitution
of all the nations beneath her sway/' This, says the
learned historian of the English Universities, Professor
Huber of Marburg, must be our guiding light in studying
the origin and growth of universities. He goes on to
say that long before the period of revived classical
learning, the Church manifested an intellectual spirit
and an objective historical method in her mode of treating
the Holy Scriptures, the Fathers of the Church, the
ancient writers and their languages, the discoveries made
by that age in natural philosophy ; and that the schools
and universities were organized and extended in a manner
parallel to the progress of the intellectual life of the time.
One might expect criticism from Marburg not to be
too friendly to Catholic claims, but Huber's judgement
as a historian is too just to allow him to endorse the
prejudiced view that the Catholic Church has not
favoured the progress of learning. Most of the continen-
tal universities, he admits, originated in entire depen-
dence on the Church, and her exercise of so important a
trust was marked by an honourable activity. In our
own country the old English universities are, as well as
we can trace, offshoots of Paris, while St. Andrews,
Aberdeen, and Glasgow owe their foundation directly to

Thomas Linacre 5

Papal Bulls. In Ireland a Papal foundation of a uni-
versity was granted long before Trinity College was
thought of.1

Linacre visited Bologna, the oldest university ; then
Florence, where Lorenzo de' Medici patronized the young
Englishman, allowing him to share the studies of Piero
and Giovanni de' Medici (the latter afterward Pope Leo X.,
and not unmindful of his old fellow-student). A year
later came Rome and the Vatican manuscripts, and
Linacre's reputation as an authority in Humanistic
learning was established.

It must be remembered in these days of cheap editions
that the early Humanists worked from manuscripts.
Scholarship and judgement in a high degree were needed
to prepare publications for the press. There were not
many publishing establishments — among them the
Aldine Press at Venice stood out conspicuously. Aldus
himself quotes " Thomas Anglicus " (Linacre) as a skilled
witness to the accuracy of the work done at Venice.
Those who till lately accepted the litterce humaniores
as the only fitting preparation for Church and State, or
who hold that opinion still, must not forget the service
rendered by the early Humanists. There was fine
scholarship amongst them, so far as the text of an author
and its artistic interpretation went ; the day of scientific
philology had not arrived. For them the paramount
duty was, so they thought, to place before the world
the buried treasures of antiquity, and to that end they
spared no labour. The deciphering of manuscripts was
no light work. Printer and scholar worke i together ;
often, as at the famous Aldine Press, the printer was a
scholar. But the first duty was to publish, to make the
author known, and known in a text that people could
depend on.

What led Linacre to specialize in the works of the old

1 Clement V. (1312), John XXII. (1320). Sir Philip Sidney in 1568
attempted to restore the Papal university of Dublin.

6 Thomas Linacre

medical writers is not known — possibly the practical
bent of the English mind to bring out something useful.
He studied medicine at Padua and Vicenza. Some of
the teachers were, like himself, students of medicine and
Humanistic scholars.

It was the custom (still surviving) to proceed to a
degree by " disputation," and there is a record of the
brilliant performance when Linacre defended his " thesis "
against the senior professors at Padua. He obtained his
degree of M.D., and soon after returned home.

Travelling was slower work then than now. One
would like to have the impressions of the graduate of
Oxford and Padua on Italy and England, and the life
of the time, but Linacre has left us little as to this. We
only know that he returned by Geneva, Paris, Calais ;
and of what befell him by the way, nothing except the
charming story of his last look on Italy. This he had
from the top of the mountain boundary, probably the
Great St. Bernard, and there he raised a rough cairn of
stones — an altar to his " sancta mater studiorum." We
have since changed the term to " alma mater " when we
speak of a university, as we have changed many other
academic practices of the past.

What was Italy, then, to move her student to such
feeling ? Long before, her own children had addressed
her in similar language. Virgil's impassioned address to
" the generous land, the great mother of heroes," was
probably in Linacre's mind. But it would be a mistake
to suppose that the Middle Ages, before Humanism be-
came dominant, were unproductive. Scholasticism pre-
ceded Humanism, and, as to the literary influence of
Scholasticism, one has but to point to its poet, Dante.

In Scholasticism organization was carried to extremes,
but it must be judged by its time. When feudalism pre-
vailed, when printing was unknown, when might was
right, not alone in the great states, but in every little
baronial jurisdiction, there was authority to which appeal

Thomas Linacre J

might still be made — the Catholic Church. Its agents
kept up free communication between the centre at Rome
and each episcopal territory. In theory, and in great
measure in practice, when Rome spoke all must obey.
What a free press does, or might do, to-day, Rome under-
took to do in the Middle Ages. Its power shielded the
weak ; before its spiritual tribunal rank counted for
nothing. That was the Church at its best, a surer
ground of judging than the taking things at their worst.
For that r6le rigid organization was necessary, — an elab-
orate canon law and an elaborate intellectual apologia.
That is the justification of Scholasticism.

But the Church never failed to support learning as
such — the history of even one religious order, that of
the Benedictines, is enough to prove this ; and in
Linacre's time the young Renaissance learning received
cordial approval and support. Mr Ruskin, indeed, thinks
it had too much support ; he dates the decay of paint-
ing in Italy from the substitution of Renaissance for
Biblical inspiration.

It is difficult to say exactly what is understood by
the term Humanities. To-day it means classics — the
Greek and Latin classics. In Linacre's time it seems to
have meant not alone classics, but the recognition of
the importance of man as an individual, and a claim,
that scholarship must be looked on as a high
aim. So far the support of the Church was freely
given. Nicholas V. and Leo X. gave the full weight of
their authority to the movement which spread from
Italy to England, Germany, and France. Vittorino
da Feltre, in Italy, gave the impulse that dominates
still the English public schools. His school at Mantua
set out as things to be aimed at : — Memory, recitation
of passages .from classical authors, correct analysis;
physical culture and exercises were received free. We
might almost think we were reading the programme of
an English High School.

8 Thomas Linacre

But when Humanism developed, as it unfortunately
did, into licence, and the masters of the New Learning
became notorious for evil living, the support of the
Church was withdrawn. The early or Catholic Human-
ists are to be distinguished from the later ; whatever
relation there may be between Humanism and the
Reformation has to do with the later phase. As Mark
Pattison says in his life of Erasmus, that great scholar
turned back from the prospect opened out when Human-
ism tried to set up in place of Scholasticism — which,
whatever may be said of its formalism and over-
elaboration, was at least constructive and elaborated
in defence of morality — a new code of irresponsibility
which must inevitably drift, as it did, into pagan licence.

Before the New Learning took that attitude it received
the warm support of the Church. Nicholas V., during
his eight years' Papacy (1447-1455), practically estab-
lished Humanism in Italy. Scholars were encouraged ;
he gave ten thousand gulden for a metrical translation
of Homer. His own erudition was such that his friend
Mneas Silvius (afterwards Pius II.) says of him, " What
he did not know was outside the pale of human know-
ledge." The Vatican Library is the best monument
of this Pope.

On his return to England Linacre found himself
famous. He was appointed tutor to the young Prince
Arthur, Henry VIII.'s eldest brother, and Italian teacher
to the Princess Mary ; but Court favour did not turn
his mind from medicine. Oxford welcomed back her
brilliant student. The Padua M.D. was admitted " ad
eundem gradum," and so began Linacre's influence on
English medicine, which is a controlling one to the
present day.

He gave some medical lectures at Oxford, but no
doubt his practical mind saw that London must be the
centre of operations, if effective work was to be done in
medical reform.

Thomas Linacre 9

In 1509 Linacre was made King's Physician to Henry
VIII. ; the annual pay was £50, about £500 of our
money. It is known that Erasmus, Archbishop Warham,
Colet, and More consulted him. His success was assured,
and the riches he amassed must have been considerable.
To one purpose his mind was set, from 1509 till 1518 —
the establishment of the profession of medicine on a firm
and lasting basis ; and towards that purpose he gave
freely. On the 23rd September 1518 Henry VIII. 's
charter constituting the Royal College of Physicians of
London was issued, with Linacre as first President.
The names of Wolsey and Linacre are cited as supporters
of the prayer that led to the issue of the charter.

No professional foundation, at home or abroad,
stands higher to-day in public estimation than this
College. Its Fellowship is recognized as evidence of
culture, professional skill, and high character : one
might say that by it the attributes of the founder are
preserved. Linacre took the Italian model as his guide
in drafting the constitution of the College, but much was
done at his own initiative.

The effect of tradition — unconscious often, " an atmo-
sphere " — is seldom altogether absent from the life of an
old foundation. Of this Oxford is a good example. If
the Repealing Act of Elizabeth were itself repealed to-
morrow, a Catholic might enter one of the old college
chapels and hear Mass without any feeling of surprise.
The solemn function would seem a natural reversion to
the founder's intention and in entire harmony with the
spirit of the place. In Ireland we know well what virtue
there is in " atmosphere." The rulers of Queen Eliza-
beth's Dublin University College have tried again and
again to bring it into touch with the bulk of Irish people,
and every time the attempt has been barred by the
impassable barrier of tradition. People say an Act of
Parliament can do anything, but there are places where
the King's writ does not run.

io Thomas Linacre

Besides the College of Physicians foundation, to
which much of Linacre's wealth was devoted (the King's
charter gave no money) , he set up classes in medicine and
Greek at the old universities. The Oxford endowment,
after many vicissitudes, has been revived by the
University Commissioners by the establishment of the
Linacre Chair of Comparative Anatomy.

Linacre has been described as a " medical Humanist "
— a not unfair estimate of his claim to public recognition.

Medicine and literature were closer together in the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries than they are now.
Literature meant scholarship, it is true, but more.

The matter of an author, not merely his style, was
valued, and, far more than that, the search for informa-
tion in Greek writers led irresistibly to a search for facts
at first hand everywhere. No doubt the search was
qualified by the conviction that facts by themselves are
of little value, and that to be of much interest they must
be subjected to the influence of reason. That was
Aristotle's method. It was not Bacon's, and Bacon's
method has been the English method for some three
hundred years — at least, that is the common belief.
Fortunately, Bacon's method was not in fact followed,
or we should not now be enjoying the fruits of many
a great investigator's work.

Aristotle wrought over a large field and was at little
pains to verify his facts, though he was a more careful
observer than people commonly give him credit for.
But there are signs that people are wearying of fact-
collection, and, not knowing exactly what to do with
the fact-heaps gathered on Bacon's system, are " going
back to Aristotle " and giving a due recognition to the
philosophic side of the process.

They do not know much of science, these early Human-
ists, and to us the absurdity is plain of seeking informa-
tion in Greek writers two thousand years back, instead
of looking at the world as it lay before them ; but, at

Thomas Linacre 1 1

least, it can be said that the masters at whose feet they
sat were intellectual giants.

This too can be said, that the Renaissance influence
directly encouraged such matter-of-fact things as ana-
tomy and botany and clinical medicine — to confine the
examples to medicine alone. Things were to be studied
at first hand ; and of all the things to be studied foremost
were placed man and what he took delight in — poetry
and art and eloquence : there was no dominating desire
to further man's creature comforts.

One characteristic of the English Humanists stands
out in the clearest relief — their altruistic attitude. Of
what they had received they desired to give. Linacre
founded a College of Medicine and gave of his wealth to
found lectureships at Oxford. Caius, who as a young
man had known Linacre, and wrote his epitaph, founded
a College. Colet, Linacre's great friend, founded the
first really free High School in England. They believed
in education.

In or about 1510 Linacre gave up public life and
became a priest. Archbishop Warham collated him
rector of Mersham in his native county. He was then
about fifty years old. In his private letters Linacre says
he wished to gain leisure for literary work. Probably
he felt his duty lay in that direction rather than in the
amassing of wealth.

Some biographers comment unfavourably on the rapid
succession of ecclesiastical preferments he received :
rector of Hawkhurst, Kent (1510) ; prebend of St.
Stephen's, Westminster (1517) ; rector of Halsworth,
Devon (1518) ; precentor of York Cathedral (1519).
Some of these benefices he resigned shortly after their
bestowal. Dr. Payne (to whose article in the Dictionary
of National Biography I am indebted for many refer-
ences) thinks the object of the presentations and resig-
nations was to obtain money from the next aspirant for
the position — " a procedure not uncommon then, and

12 Thomas Linacre

not unknown now," he adds. I am slow to make this
assumption. There is no evidence for it other than the
dates given. As Professor Walsh remarks, the cost of
induction must have been heavy, and it is at least as
probable a theory that Warham wished to get the
influence of Linacre's known organizing capacity to bear
on the affairs of establishments in need of reform. Lin-
acre was in no need of money ; and, again, money to
him was only in trust for good purposes.

Archbishop Warham, the patron of most of the
benefices, was likely enough to give a poor scholar
preferment — he gave Erasmus the benefice of Aldington
in Kent ; but there personal kindness would stop. He
was not, like Wolsey, a great courtier, but he was more —
he was a great Churchman. " He had sufficient time for
a scrupulous performance of the accustomed exercises of
prayer, for the almost daily celebration of the Mass, for
twice or thrice hearing Divine Service . . . for the visita-
tion of churches when regulation . . . was needed." This
is Erasmus's description, and Erasmus was quick enough
to detect faults. The last words support the suggestion
that Linacre was expected to help in administration.

Of Linacre's personal character the element which his
contemporaries emphasize is his hatred of deceit. He
was, to quote his epitaph written by Caius — himself one
of the foremost Englishmen of the sixteenth century,
who did not use words lightly — " one that hated above
all deceit and underhand work, a true friend, dear to
rich and poor alike." Until more direct evidence of
traffic in benefices is offered, we may safely fall back on
this contemporary testimony to the integrity of Warham
and Linacre. Froude says that Archbishop Warham
died poor, " left scarce enough to bury him."

In a lecture by Professor Dewey delivered at Columbia
University, New York (1910), he speaks of " Protestant
Humanism re-editing Catholic Scholasticism." The
relation between Protestantism and Humanism is too

Thomas Linacre 13

big a question to discuss here, but one must protest
against the assumption that it was exclusively a Protes-
tant possession. There were Catholic Humanists before
the new creed had gained many adherents ; the names
of some have been alluded to, and stress laid on one
characteristic — their zeal in educational reform. The
College of Physicians was, as we have seen, Linacre's
work. " Caius keeps his memory green " in Caius
College, Cambridge. Colet, Linacre's great friend, as
has been already stated, founded the first really free
school in London — St. Paul's. " Despite (!) his training
at Oxford for an ecclesiastical career under Popish dis-
pensation," Howard Staunton (Great Schools of England)
says of Colet that " he was from his youth one of the
most zealous, able, and influential promoters of renewed
life in religion and letters."

I do not know what manner of man this writer would
expect to see as the normal result of " a training at
Oxford under Popish dispensation," but he is very frank
in his appreciation of Colet, and his criticism expresses
fairly what Colet and the other Catholic Humanists tried
to do. Colet founded St. Paul's " in the yeare of our
Lordei5i2 . . . in the honor of Chris te Jesu in childhood
(in pueritia) and of his blessed moder Marie." " There
shall be taughte in the Scole children of all Nations and
Centres." " A childe at the first admission, once and for
ever, shall pay 46.." It was a liberal scheme. We may
note in passing that the school work of the Renaissance
scholars, in so far as it was early English and Catholic,
and bound by many ties to the universities, may claim
direct descent from Waynflete and Wykeham, Bishops
of Winchester. From 1380 (Winchester) to 1509 (St.
Paul's) there was constructive work going on in English
education which has left its mark on English character.
The Protestant Renaissance cannot be denied, but the
existence of a Catholic Renaissance and its progressive
and liberal spirit must not be ignored.

14 Thomas Linacre

Something may now be said of Linacre's intimate life.
The fine portrait in the Royal Galleries (said to be the
work of Quentin Matsys), which is our best presentation
of him, shows a grave enough demeanour, as befits a
physician dealing with the ills that flesh is heir to ; but
there are lines about the mouth that suggest the posses-
sion of some share of the divine gift of humour and its
accompaniment of kindly tolerance of other people's ways.

He saw good company — Lorenzo de' Medici and the
Tudor kings and princesses, — but perhaps never better
than that which he met at Stepney — a name which
nowadays does not suggest rural surroundings, but in
the sixteenth century it was a pleasant suburb of London.

Colet was rector of Stepney, and More, Erasmus, and
Linacre were there often as his guests : we may be sure
there was pleasant talk as well as mention of grave
matters. The gaiety of More — not to be suppressed
even when mounting the scaffold to suffer for conscience'
sake ; Erasmus' scholarly humour, and the unfailing
gentleness of disposition that made him friends in the
most unlikely quarters ; found an admirable foil in
Linacre's dignified gravity.

We may hear Erasmus asking the sympathy of the
company in so far as he had not the benefit of Linacre's
advice on his last trip across the Channel, or that a
prescription of the famous English physician had failed
to be interpreted properly by a foreign practitioner.
Colet's mother, who held Erasmus in high favour, is of
the party. This is what Erasmus says of her : "I knew
in England the mother of John Colet, a matron of singular
piety. She had by the same husband eleven sons and
as many daughters, all which hopeful brood was snatched
away from her except her eldest son, and she lost her
husband far advanced in years ; she herself being come
up to her goth year looked so smooth and was so cheerful,
that you would think she had never shed a tear nor
brought a child into the world. That which supplied a

Thomas Linacre 15

woman with so much fortitude was not learning, but
piety toward God."

Of Erasmus himself it may be noted that the work
De Amabili Ecclesice Concordia, published in 1533, three
years before his death, in which he gives us his last word,
" Without the unity of the Church there can be no
Christian peace," may be taken as fixing his position.
In that book, it has been said, is the soul of Erasmus.
This is what Erasmus says of others of the party : —
" When Colet speaks I might be listening to Plato.
Linacre is as deep and acute a thinker as I have ever met
with. Grocyn is a mine of knowledge. And Nature
never formed a sweeter and happier disposition than
that of Thomas More."

The rectory garden was evidently a feature of the
scene, for we are told that Madame Colet's strawberries
were among the first imported from Holland, Erasmus's
gift, and that the damask roses introduced into England
by Linacre were another part of the hostess's possessions.

It is a pleasing picture, that Stepney meeting — looked
back on, perhaps, in less happy times with a keener feel-
ing of the peace and happiness that were all the more real
because unconsciously enjoyed.

Linacre's writings are chiefly translations from Greek
(direct from the manuscripts) into Latin. They include
the works of Galen in many volumes — that on Tempera-
ment is said to have been the first book printed in Greek
type in England. The dedications are to Wolsey, to
Henry VIII. (by command), to Warham. Erasmus
speaks of the extreme fastidiousness of Linacre as to
publishing ill-prepared matter ; probably this accounts
for the non-appearance of the translation of Aristotle
which Erasmus tells us had been made in Latin as clear
and thorough as Aristotle's Greek. There was also a
series of grammars, one for St. Paul's School (the basis
of Colet's) , another for the Princess Mary, On the Structure
of Latin Speech — a standard work for many years.

1 6 Thomas Linacre

Aldus speaks of the severe classic beauty of Linacre's
style, and hopes the Italian scholars may profit thereby.

Linacre died on 2oth October 1524, and was buried
in the old Cathedral of St. Paul's, London. No memorial
marked his grave till 1557, when Caius wrote the epitaph
already quoted (p. 12).

ANDREAS VESALIUS

(1514-1564)

JAMES J. WALSH, M.D., PH.D., L.H.D., Sc.D.,

Dean and Professor of the History of Medicine and of Nervous Diseases

at Fordham University School of ' Medicine > New York.

PROPERLY to appreciate the career of Vesalius, who so
eminently deserves the title of Father of Modern Anatomy
which subsequent generations, and especially our own,
have generally accorded him, it is extremely important
to recall that his life falls in the midst of the period that
is usually spoken of as the Renaissance. He is a striking
example of the power of accomplishment that came to so
many at this wonderful time. Bora in 1512, dying in 1564,
the year of Michel Angelo's death and Shakespeare's birth,
his life occurs just in the midst of the great period. Among
his contemporaries, besides Michel Angelo, were such men
as Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, Ariosto, Rabelais,
Montaigne ; while Camoens, and even Tasso and Cervantes,
as well as Lope de Vega, were growing to manhood before
his death. There are many others in his time whose names
we scarcely recall in this company, though had their careers
fallen on any other time they would seem bright particular
stars because of the brilliancy of their accomplishment.

The names that we have mentioned are those which

are likely to occur whenever a reasonably well-read

person thinks of the Renaissance. They are the painters,

sculptors, architects, and writers of the time. For most

2 17 I

2 Andreas Vesalius

people the Renaissance represents a rebirth in arts and
letters. Often it is forgotten that there was a correspond-
ing rebirth in science, both theoretic and applied, at this
time. There were great mathematicians and astrono-
mers, distinguished physicians who did ground-breaking
work in chemistry, and above all in anatomy ; and there
were workers in other sciences whose names are fondly
remembered by those who follow them in the after time,
and who have interest enough to know something about
the history of their specialty. Such names as Copernicus,
Paracelsus, Vesalius, Columbus, Varolius, Eustachius,
and Caesalpinus, with others that might readily be men-
tioned, show how truly this was a time of rebirth in science
as well as in arts and letters. Only too often this is
forgotten in the persuasion that science, in the sense of
observations on physical nature and the deduction of the
laws and principles that underlie physical phenomena,
is a comparatively modern development. Anyone who
knows Renaissance science well is not likely to think of
much of our modern science as new in any proper sense
of the word.1

There are some who are inclined to take the word
Renaissance in a certain literal signification, and to pre-
sume that it represents a rebirth out of nothingness, as
if the great movement of the time sprang into life where

1 The rather interesting reflection has been made that in all
Europe at the time of the Renaissance there was altogether
a population of not more than 40,000,000 of people. In our
Western civilization, which corresponds to the Europe of that
time, we have probably 500,000,000 of people. If there is any
law of progress in humanity, then we ought to have at least a
dozen times as many great men as they had during the six-
teenth century. Genius was so common at that time that, as
James Russell Lowell suggests, almost any family might expect
to have an attack of it, just as it might expect to have an attack
of measles. It would be rather difficult, however, to find not a
dozen times, but even half as many great men whose work will
influence the future as Renaissance genius did. Of course it is
well understood that the occurrence of genius follows no law,
but the reflection is made as illustrating how superficial is the
conviction which presumes constant progress in mankind.

Andreas Vesalius 3

there had been none before. The mistake is much less
common than it used to be, but it still exists in many
minds. Nothing could well be less true than that there
were not great human achievements during the centuries
preceding the Renaissance. I am one of those who
incline to think that the thirteenth century, because of
the diffusion of its greatness among a wider circle of
mankind, must be considered as having achieved even
more than the sixteenth. In the century immediately
preceding the year 1500, however, there is abundant
evidence of fine productivity in art and letters, and
also in science. Cusanus and Regiomontanus, who did
such fine work in mathematics and astronomy — Cantor
in his History of Mathematics devotes more than a score
of pages to each of them, — such men as Berengarius,
the anatomist who first described the appendix, John
de Vigo, who wrote the first important text-book on
gun-shot wounds, and John of Arcoli, who discussed the
filling of teeth and many more supposedly modern
inventions in dentistry, are only a few typical examples
of the men who in the later fifteenth century were laying
deep and strong the foundations on which Renaissance
genius was to build a magnificent structure of science
in the great sixteenth century period.

Italy had been for centuries before this time, and
continued to be for at least two centuries after it, the
home of post-graduate work. We are rather proud of
our opportunities for post-graduate work in the modern
time, and sometimes forget that enthusiastic students
have always sought and found special facilities for
pursuing their studies even though they had to go to
a distance to obtain it. During the latter half of the
nineteenth century Germany has been the home of post-
graduate work, especially in the sciences. During the
early part of the nineteenth century, France, where
such men as Ampere, Dumas, Lamarck, Cuvier, Geoffroy
Saint-Hilaire, and Laennec, were doing their work, was

19 i*

4 Andreas Vesalius

the Mecca for earnest students from other countries.
There are few, however, apparently who realize that for
six centuries before that time Italy was almost con-
stantly the magnet to attract students desiring to have
ampler facilities for special study than their educational
institutions at home had been able to supply them with,
and who wished to bring back new information and
incentive for work to their own country. At the end of
the eighteenth century, such men as Galvani, Volta,
Beccaria, Spallanzani, and Morgagni were teaching there,
and, before that, for half a millennium the world teachers
had been at the Italian universities.

Just before the beginning of the sixteenth century
Linacre had gone from England to Italy in order to
complete his education in medicine and the humanities.
When he crossed the Alps on his return into his own
country, he built an altar on which, in true classic spirit,
he made burnt offerings at that point on the road from
which he got the last glimpse of the fair Italy that had
been his alma mater studiorum. Students from many
other parts of Europe also went to Italy about and
after this time, because it was realized that the best
opportunities for advanced work were there to be found.
This was as true in science as it was in the humanities.
Copernicus had gone there in order to complete his
education in mathematics, astronomy, and medicine.
When students came from distant Poland and England,
it is easy to understand that there must have been many
from the intervening countries.

Among these, within the ten years after the middle of
the first half of the century, came a young man from
Belgium, by name Vesalius, who, after having exhausted
the possibilities of study in anatomy in his native country,
had gone to Paris, and, disappointed there, had then
proceeded to Italy. Here he was, in the course of a few
years, before he was thirty years of age, to revolutionize
the study of anatomy, and a little later to publish a great

Andreas Vesalius 5

text-book illustrated by plates of actual dissections that
is one of the world's bibliographic treasures.

In Italy he was brought in contact, either personally
or through his writings, sometimes indeed as fellow
student, with a set of men worthy to be his colleagues.
At the middle of the century, when he had completed
the best part of his work, he had had personal relations
of the most intimate kind with such men as Columbus,
who succeeded him in the professorship of anatomy at
Bologna, and to whom we attribute the discovery of
the circulation of the blood in the lungs ; Varolius, whose
name is attached to the pons in the brain, though he died
at the early age of thirty-two ; Eustachius, after whom
several structures in the human body are deservedly
named, and whose studies of the anatomy of the head
are still classics; Csesalpinus, to whom the Italians
rightly attribute the discovery of the general circulation,
for his works contain a complete description of it a full
generation before Harvey's time ; and Fallopius, whose
name is attached to the Fallopian tubes. There are
others whose names will not be forgotten in the history
of medicine who were doing work in the Italian univer-
sities of the time, but these are the most distinguished.
One other, at least, we should name, John Caius, Vesalius's
fellow student and room-mate at Padua, who returned
to England to introduce the practice of dissection there,
and later on to found Caius College, Cambridge.

This is the background on which the life of Vesalius
must be seen if it is to be properly understood. He was
a product of the Renaissance, born in Belgium, educated
at the University of Louvain, and then trained for his
great life-work in anatomy in Italy. There are writers
who have said that there was Church opposition to
dissection at this time. It has been rather the custom 1
to hold up even Vesalius himself as a " Horrible Ex-
ample " (capitals are required rightly to emphasize the

1 See White, Warfare of Science with Theology, vol. ii. 54, */ stq.
21

6 Andreas Vesalius

expression as some would use it) of Church persecution
in this matter, and emphatic assertions are made that
whatever dissection he did had to be accomplished in
secret and in fear and trembling of the Inquisition,
the Holy Office, the ecclesiastical authorities, etc.

Some who realize how nonsensical is such talk in the
light of the realities of the history of anatomy and the
wonderful development of that science in the Italian
universities of this time, declare that Vesalius obtained
his opportunities for dissection in spite of the ecclesias-
tical authorities, because Padua was in the Venetian
territories, and the Venetian Senate, at this time in
opposition to the Popes, refused to enforce ecclesiastical
decrees. This statement is even more nonsensical than
the other, however, because it represents a definite far-
fetched endeavour to bolster up a bad case that can only
have been dictated by anti-clerical zeal. Dissection
was practised at all the Italian universities at this time,
and nowhere more than at Rome itself.

Vesalius taught not only in Padua, but also in Bologna.
That city was at this time in the Papal States. One of
his great predecessors at Bologna, Berengar of Carpi,
first to describe the appendix, had made many dissections
there. Columbus, who succeeded Vesalius as lecturer
in Padua and was professor at Bologna, was afterwards
called to Rome and did many public dissections there.
When his great text-book of anatomy was published,
it was dedicated to Pope Paul IV. Eustachius, Varolius,
Csesalpinus, and Piccolomini, who are the great writers
on anatomy, the ardent dissectors of this century after
Vesalius and Columbus, were all Papal physicians and
professors of anatomy at the Papal medical school.
They had made their reputations by dissection work in
other universities, and then were called to the medical
school at Rome because they were considered the best
candidates for the good work the Popes wanted done there.
At the time when Vesalius is sometimes represented as

Andreas Vesalius 7

doing his dissections in fear and trembling, Columbus
at Rome was making autopsies on many distinguished
ecclesiastics, cardinals, archbishops, and bishops, in
order to determine what they died of. We have the
protocols of these autopsies. Many of his dissections
were done publicly and were attended both by promi-
nent ecclesiastics of Rome itself and by others who were
visitors ad limina.

For those who think that there was any ecclesiastical
opposition to dissection at this time, the following
paragraph written by Dr George Jackson Fisher in his
Historical and Bibliographical Notes for the Annals of
Anatomy and Surgery (Brooklyn, 1878-1880), will be
illuminating. Dr Fisher, I may say, was a well-known
collector of old medical books, a special student of the
history of medicine in these times, and was looked up
to as probably one of the best informed of our generation
in the history of dissection. He said :

" The fame of Columbus as an anatomical teacher was
exceedingly great and widespread. Students were
attracted to the universities where he professed, from
all quarters and in large numbers. He was an ardent
student of his favourite science, and was imbued with
the genius and enthusiasm of an original investigator.
He was not satisfied with the critical examination of
mere structure, but extended his researches into the
more subtle, difficult, and important investigation of
the physiological function. He has been most aptly
styled the Claude Bernard of the sixteenth century.
The work of Columbus is a masterpiece of method and
purity of style, as well as on account of its richness in
facts and observations. He spent over forty years in
these studies and researches. He dissected an extraor-
dinary number of human bodies. It must have been an
age of remarkable tolerance for scientific investigation, for
in a single year he dissected no less than fourteen bodies.
He also entered the crypts and catacombs of ancient

23 i**

8 Andreas Vesalius

churches, where the bones of the dead had been preserved
and had accumulated century after century, and there,
with unwearied care, he handled and compared over a
half-million of human skulls."1

The only difficulty with regard to dissection in Vesalius's
time was the procuring of bodies for the purpose. This
was not due to religious scruples, but to the very human
feeling of objection to having the body of a friend, and
above all of a relative, subjected to what seemed an
indignity. In English-speaking countries, at least, we
are very familiar with that, for we are only just beyond
the time when it hampered the development of ana-
tomical science and teaching very much. There is a
speech of Macaulay in the English Parliament, made
some seventy-five years ago, in which he pleads for the
passage of a bill providing anatomical material. In the
United States, two generations ago, many of the bodies

1 Probably the most interesting historical commentary on this
whole discussion with regard to the supposed ecclesiastical
prohibition or limitation of dissection at this time, is to be
found in the fact that we have abundant evidence in sketches
from their hands that all of the great artists of the early six-
teenth century did dissections, and seem, indeed, to have done
them very freely, or had the chance to study them without stint.
Michel Angelo made special studies in the anatomy of muscles
after dissection. Raphael, at the height of his fame as artist,
turned to dissection in order to learn human anatomy better.
Titian, according to one tradition which is not however, certain,
made the plates for Vesalius's Anatomy. If not by Titian they
are by one of his pupils, a distinguished artist. The main reason
for an artist taking up such work was to have the opportunity to
study the dissected specimens which had been made for the
illustrations. Leonardo da Vinci made special studies in the
anatomy of man and the horse with a large number of dis-
sections. He is said to have written a short treatise with regard
to dissection and made a series of plates of mesial, sagittal
sections of the male and female bodies. In other countries
the same custom as to dissection for artists was established.
Albrecht Diirer made a series of dissections, and French artists
did the same thing. If artists, all of whom were in intimate
relations with the ecclesiastics of the time, made dissections thus
freely, there surely could have been no difficulty for physicians
to do so or to obtain all the material that they cared to use.

Andreas Vesalius 9

for dissecting purposes were obtained by " resurrections."
As late as twenty-five years ago that practice still
obtained in some States. Almost needless to say, there
were no religious elements in the opposition to pro-
viding anatomical material in the modern time, nor, as
we have pointed out, were there in Vesalius's time. At
both periods educated clergymen and the ecclesiastical
authorities were ranged on the side of enlightened
privilege in this matter.

After clearing away some of the false notions with
regard to his times, which have been widely prevalent
and marvellously persistent in spite of the absolute lack
of truth in them — anti-religious prejudice is always
particularly hard to overcome or reason with, — it will
be easier to understand the career of the man who so
deservedly has been called the Father of Modern
Anatomy.

Andreas Vesalius, or Wesele, as his name ran in his
native Low Dutch, was born in Brussels, the capital of
what was then called the Duchy of Brabant, in the year
1514 or 1515. The doubt with regard to the date is
due to the fact that his birth took place on the night
of December 31, or possibly at a morning hour of
January I, 1515. The family name is derived from the
district of Wesel in Cleves in which his ancestors had
formerly resided. Vesalius's ancestors had for many
generations been distinguished in various departments
of science, medicine, and mathematics. His great-
great-grandfather had translated some treatises of
Avicenna, and especially had succeeded at considerable
cost in having copies made of certain Arabic medical
works. His son, Vesalius's great-grandfather, occupied
the position of physician-in-ordinary to Maria of Bur-
gundy, the wife of the German Emperor, Maximilian I.,
the distinguished patron of letters in the Renaissance
period. He lived to an advanced age as a professor
of medicine in Louvain. From this time Vessalius'

IO Andreas Vesalius

family always continued in official medical relation to
the Austro-Burgundian ruling family. His grandfather
took his father's place as physician to Mary of Burgundy,
and wrote a series of commentaries on the aphorisms of
Hippocrates. Vesalius's own father was the physician
and apothecary to Charles V. for a while, and accom-
panied the Emperor on journeys and campaigns.

With an heredity like this, it will not be surprising to
find that Vesalius was tendered and accepted the post
of royal physician to Charles V. when he had reached
the age and attained the prestige to fit him for such a
responsible post. Recent biographers seem to think
that the main reason why Vesalius accepted the position
offered by Charles V. was that he was disgusted with
the persecution of the Galenists and the ecclesiastics in
Italy, and that he wished to escape from such un-
comfortable surroundings. As a matter of fact, how-
ever, he and his family must have looked forward for
many years to the possibility of his taking this position.
After all, there are very few men so deeply interested in
science as, for its sake, to refuse advantages, financial and
personal, such as were thus held out to Vesalius.

From his earliest years he was known for his tendency
to be inquisitive with regard to natural objects, and
while still a mere boy his anatomical curiosity mani-
fested itself in a very practical way. He recalls himself
in later years that the bladders with which he learned
to swim, and which were also used by the children of
the time as play toys for making all sorts of noises,
became in his hands objects of anatomical investigation.
Anatomy means the cutting up of things, and this
Vesalius literally did with the bladders. He noted
particularly that they were composed of layers and
fibres of various kinds, and later in life, when he was
studying the veins in human and animal bodies, he was
reminded of these early observations, and pointed out
that the vein walls were made up of structures not

Andreas Vesalius n

unlike to, though more delicate than, those of which
the bladders of his childhood days had proved to be
composed.

Vesalius's early education was received entirely in his
native town. There were certain preparatory schools
in connection with the University at Louvain, and to
one of these — called Pedagogium Castri, because of the
sign over the door, a fort — Vesalius was sent. Here
he learned Latin and Greek and some Hebrew. How
well he learned his Latin will be readily realized from
the fact that at twenty-two he was fitted to lecture on
anatomy in Italy in that language. His knowledge of
Greek can be judged from the circumstance that he
could translate Galen at sight, and was known to have
corrected a number of errors in translations from that
author made by preceding translators. To those who
know the traditions of that time in the teaching of the
classic languages along the Rhine and in the Low
Countries, these accomplishments of Vesalius will not
be surprising. They knew how to teach in those pre-
reformation days, and probably Latin and Greek have
never been better taught than by the Brethren of the
Common Life, whose schools for nearly a hundred years
had in the Low Countries and Rhenish Germany been
open to the children of all classes, but especially
of the poor. Erasmus, Thomas a Kempis, Alexander
Hegius, Agricola, Cusanus, were the products of these
schools. Other schools of the region could scarcely
fail to be uplifted by such educational traditions.

Altogether, Vesalius spent some nine years in the
Pedagogium. Then he seems to have spent five further
years in the University itself, where he studied phil-
osophy and philology as well as languages and literature.
It may be noted, as illustrating how a student will find
that which appeals to him even in the most unexpected
sources, that Vesalius took special interest in certain
treatises of Albertus Magnus and Michael Scotus which

12 Andreas Vesalius

dealt with the human body in the rather halting, in-
complete way of the medieval scholars, and yet with a
precious amount of information that this scientifically
inquisitive youth eagerly drank in. More interesting
for Vesalius himself were certain studies undertaken
entirely independently of his university course. One
of his biographers declares that he dissected small
animals, rats and mice, and occasionally even dogs and
cats, in his eagerness to learn the details of anatomy
for himself and at first hand.

The educational traditions of the University at Louvain
were the very best. At the end of the fifteenth and the
beginning of the sixteenth centuries the University had
probably more students than any other university in
Europe, except that of Paris, and it seems likely that the
number in attendance during the first half of the sixteenth
century was always in excess of 5000. The University
was especially famous for its work in jurisprudence and
philology. The faculty of theology, however, was con-
sidered to be one of the strongest in Europe, and Louvain
was always strongly opposed to the progress of Luther-
anism, and was one of the bulwarks of the Catholic
Church. Such the University continued to be for several
centuries, and though it was suppressed in Napoleon's
time, it was refounded towards the end of the first
quarter of the nineteenth century, and has nobly con-
tinued the traditions of the past. It was while professor
at Louvain that Theodore Schwann published the little
book which is the foundation of the cell doctrine and
the very corner-stone of modern biology.

After graduating at Louvain in philosophy and
philology, Vesalius went to Paris to study medicine.
At this time at Paris, Sylvius, after whom one of the
most important fissures of the brain, the sylvian, is
named, was not only teaching anatomy in a very interest-
ing way, but was also providing opportunities for original
research in anatomy in connection with his own investiga-

Andreas Vesalius 13

tions. The interest that his teaching excited may be
gathered from the fact that over four hundred students
were in attendance at his lectures. Besides Sylvius,
Giinther of Andernach in Germany was also teaching in
Paris, and with both of these distinguished professors,
Vesalius, owing partly to the deep interest he displayed
in the subject, and partly to the influence he was able
to exert because of letters of introduction from court
physicians, became intimately associated. It was at
Paris that Vesalius first showed the practical temper of
his character and his intense desire to learn anatomy at
first hand. The dissections used to be done by the
barber surgeons, rather ignorant men, who knew little
of their work, but the demonstrators in anatomy at this
time considered it beneath them to use the knife them-
selves. Vesalius, however, insisted on doing his dis-
sections for himself.

Not being able, however, to secure facilities for study
and opportunities for original work such as he desired,
Vesalius did not remain long at Paris, but returned after
a year to his home in the Low Countries. At Louvain
he continued his anatomical studies, finding it difficult
enough to procure human material, but using such as
might come to hand. The story is told of his first
successful attempt to get a complete skeleton. A felon
had been executed just outside the walls of Louvain
some time before, and his remains, according to the legal
regulations of that time, were allowed to swing in chains
on the gibbet until the birds had eaten his flesh and
the wind and rain had bleached his bones. Needless
to say, these bones were a great temptation to Vesalius.
Finally, one night he and a fellow student stole out of
the town and robbed the gibbet of its treasure. In
order to accomplish their task — no easy one, because
the skeleton was fastened to the beams of the scaffold
by iron shackles — they had to remain outside the gates
of the city all night. Unable to carry it all back at one

14 Andreas Vesalius

time without great risk of detection, they buried it and
later removed it piecemeal. When they had finally
assembled the parts again, it was exhibited as a skeleton
brought from Paris.

Louvain at this time was not the small university
town that it is now, but one of the most important towns
in Europe. It has been calculated that it had nearly
200,000 inhabitants, and its business relations were very
extensive. Vesalius, however, was not satisfied with
his private studies, and even this important city could
not supply him with facilities for his desired researches.
Opportunities for anatomical investigation were known
to be abundant in Italy, so it was not long before he
made his way there. At first Vesalius seems to have
spent some time in Venice, where he attracted con-
siderable attention by his thoroughly practical anatomi-
cal knowledge and independent mode of thinking. After
only a short period in Venice, however, he proceeded to
Padua, where he spent some months in preparation for his
doctor's examination. It is known that, having com-
pleted his examination in the early part of December
1537, he was allowed within a few days to begin the
teaching of anatomy, and, indeed, was given the title
of professor by the university authorities. The next
six years were spent in teaching at Padua, Bologna,
and Pisa, and in fruitful investigation. Every oppor-
tunity to make dissections was gladly seized, and Vesa-
lius' influence enabled him to obtain a large amount of
excellent anatomical material. He began at once the
preparations for the publication of an important work
on the anatomy of the human body. This was published
in 1543 at Basle, at a time when its author was not yet
thirty years of age. It is one of the classics of anatomi-
cal literature. Even at the present day it is often con-
sulted by those who wish to see the illustrative details
of Vesalius's wonderful dissections as given in the magnifi-
cent plates that the work contains. In the early editions

Andreas Vesalius 15

it has become one of the most precious of medical books,
and is eagerly sought for by collectors.

Vesalius's observations related to the anatomy of every
portion of the body. His work is founded on his own
studies, and only in minor points does he accept the
authority of previous writers. It would not be hard
to show what a very great difference this made in
anatomical teaching. Roth has taken the knee-cap and
the sternum (breast-bone) as examples of what was
known before and after Vesalius. Vesalius's teaching
with regard to both of these is the basis of our modern
teaching, and very little has been added to his descrip-
tions. His predecessors had made egregious blunders,
as a rule, because of dependence on animal dissections
rather than actual observations on human bodies. It
must not be thought, however, that Vesalius's observa-
tions concern mainly the bones, and above all not
exclusively. He added just as much to the exact
scientific knowledge of the soft parts. This is particu-
larly noticeable with regard to feminine anatomy.
Female bodies had been particularly hard to procure
for dissection purposes, and there were many erroneous
teachings with regard to feminine anatomy. Vesalius
himself found it difficult to obtain female bodies, for
women do not often die as strangers in cities distant
from their homes; but we know that he dissected at
least six of them (probably more), and he revolutionized
the teaching in this department of anatomy.

If there are any who think that fine book-making is
a modern development, and that our text-books of the
modern time must, by the very fact of the accumulation
of information as to how best to illustrate teaching, be
better than those of three centuries and a half ago, he
only needs to have a look into Vesalius's great text-book
of anatomy, published in 1543, to be convinced that
probably nothing better than this has ever been pro-
vided for teaching purposes in anatomy, so far as devo-

1 6 Andreas Vesalius

tion to it to make it technically perfect may go. The
anatomical illustrations are finely made. They are real
works of art. Skeletons are not represented in the
conventional standing or pendant position, but in a
number of attitudes that illustrate bone functions and
relations very well. The same thing is true for plates
illustrating myology. The attitudes of the muscle-
clothed skeletons are full of expression and make very
clear the functions of the various muscles. There is a
tradition that these fine plates, or at least the sketches
for them, were made by Titian, but it seems much more
probable that they were made by Titian's distinguished
pupil, Kalkar, whose name occurs in such variant forms
as Calcard and Calcarensis. The difference between
these plates and those of preceding authors on anatomy
is immense, but it is not greater than that between
Vesalius and many writers on anatomy long after
his time.

In his second edition Vesalius made a great many
changes, all of them meant more fully to develop
anatomical knowledge. This second edition, issued in
1555, omitted many autobiographical details, and, as it
was this edition that was most used, until comparatively
recent years there was apparently a dearth of informa-
tion with regard to its author. As Vesalius grew older,
however, he had learned to care less about himself and
more about his work as a contribution to science. He
corrected many passages even in punctuation, and made
a new index ; repetitions were eliminated, and the order
of the contents improved. He dispenses with a number
of attacks that he had made on Galen, apparently with
the idea of eliminating controversial matters. He de-
scribed a new instrument with which he penetrated the
hard bones in order to study them. He discussed the
possibility of the existence of valves in the veins, but
thought that the appearances which had been described
were only thickenings of the walls. He added a number

Andreas Vesalius 17

of details in regard to the genital regions and the anatomy
of the embryo and accompanying parts. He was evi-
dently labouring to make his text-book just as valuable
as possible for serious students of anatomy, without
any question of its cost or of the labour involved
for him.

Vesalius has taken advantage of the opportunity
presented by his figures of skeletons to teach certain
ethical lessons. Two of the plates, for instance, one in
the Fabrica and the other in his Epitome, represent
skeletons standing in a pose of meditation beside a
pedestal, the skull resting on the left hand, the elbow on
the pedestal, while beneath the other hand, the subject
of the meditation as it were, is a second skull. On the
base of the pedestal are the words, in Latin, " Vivitur
ingenio caetera mortis erunt."

The plate in the Epitome has practically the same
pose for the skeleton, but on the pedestal are the words
" Solvitur omne decus leto, niveos que per artus. It
stygius color et formae populatur honores."

For ten years more Vesalius devoted himself to his
favourite studies in anatomy and physiology, and to
the application of his discoveries to practical medicine
and surgery. He was summoned in consultations on
all sides, and was evidently considered one of the greatest
medical practitioners of his time. This is a side of his
character and development that we cannot help but
think his biographers have missed, when they have
assumed that the reason for his acceptance of the post
of royal physician to Charles V. was the result of dis-
couragement in his purely scientific studies by the
followers of Galen. No little sympathy, indeed, has
been wasted, to our mind, on this phase of Vesalius's
career, since there seems no doubt that he gladly accepted
what was after all the best possible opportunity, in his
time, for the pursuit of the clinical phases of medicine
in which he had become so much interested.

1 8 Andreas Vesalius

All his life Vesalius had been interested in the practical
side of medicine and surgery. While the making of
anatomical observations was his special life-work, and
while he never missed an opportunity to make them,
the applications of his discoveries seem always to have
been uppermost in his mind. There is scarcely a docu-
ment relating to his years of investigation, especially in
Italy, which does not bear evidence of his abiding
interest in the practical side of medicine. To have the
opportunities that would be afforded then by the im-
portant post offered him by Charles V., who, it must be
remembered, was at that time the monarch of Spain
and the Netherlands, as well as the Emperor of Germany,
the ruler, in a word, of most of the civilized world, for
Spain dominated the greater part of America also, was
just what Vesalius most desired.

Some of the practical work that he had been doing
in Italy was of the greatest importance. He worked
out the interesting clinical phenomenon that the spleen
is likely to be affected whenever there is any liver
disturbance. He pointed out that this is especially
true with regard to atrophic conditions of the liver.
Enlargement of the spleen in these cases seemed to
Vesalius to be compensatory, and he suggested the
thought that the spleen might perhaps take up some of
the liver functions.

Very early in life he recognized the fact that the
lower part of the thorax might be very much narrowed
by the wearing of a corset, and that this interfered with
the functions both of the liver and of the lungs. This
is said to be the first time that attention was called to
this particular evil effect of wearing the corset, and
indeed the observation is supposed to be much more
recent. It serves to show very clearly how practical
was Vesalius' view of things.

After his studies in normal anatomy, he devoted much
time to pathological anatomy and never let the patho-

Andreas Vesalius 19

logical side of things escape him. There was even
question of his writing a text-book on pathological
anatomy, though this was never completed, nor were
his notes apparently of sufficient value to deserve
publication after his death. There are many illustra-
tions of his watchfulness of the significance of patho-
logical conditions that might be noted. Even a few of
them will emphasize his interest in clinical medicine.

The best evidence of the practical nature of Vesalius's
devotion to medicine is to be found in his observations
on aneurisms. We have altogether the notes of six
cases of aneurisms observed by him. He was the first
in the modern time to call attention to the spontaneous
development of this lesion and to study the methods by
which its presence could be recognized. The Greek
authors had studied the condition, but Vesalius dis-
tinctly advanced the knowledge to be found in medical
literature up to his time. He was the first who ever
recognized an internal aneurism on a living subject,
and the diagnosis that he made in this case remained
unique of its kind for over one hundred years.

If in addition to this we recall the breadth of his
interests in medicine, his place as a physician, in the
fullest sense of the word, will be better understood.
In Paris we hear of his visiting the leper houses; in
Italy he made many observations on internal diseases
and practised surgery. He even succeeded, as we shall
see, in finding opportunities for the special study of
parturition. No moment passed without his thinking
of the practical side of medicine. Even his text-book
of anatomy has many practical observations, and his
descriptions of the joints, the muscles, the organs of
special sense, the pelvis, and the female genital organs,
all demonstrate that fact.

The most interesting evidence, from a modern stand-
point, that we have for Vesalius's recognition of the fact
that anatomy must be developed as a practical science,

2O Andreas Vesalius

is to be found, first, in his inquiries with regard to the
history of the persons whose bodies came to him for
dissection whenever anything out of the common was
discovered in them, and, secondly, his study of anatomi-
cal relations on living subjects. For instance, when he
found in a dissection that the optic nerves were un-
crossed, he made inquiries as to whether the person
during life had suffered from double vision. When in
the body of one of the rowers of a papal vessel he found
a second biliary canal emptying into the stomach, he
made inquiries as to whether there had been during life
any vomiting of bile. There had been none, and Vesalius
notes that fact, though Galen had declared that in such
cases biliary vomiting must be frequent.

His observations on living subjects began with himself
and the eruption of a wisdom tooth. He experimented
with his respiratory movements, and enumerates the
sensitive points along the nerves that run to the fingers.
Certain of his friends were able to move their ears, and
he made special observations on them. One of his
students had such control over the manual muscles that
he could hold water on the back of his hands. He notes
that a wandering performer in Padua was able to lift
a twenty-five pound iron bar with his teeth and throw
it thirty-nine feet behind him. Vesalius himself con-
trolled the weights and measurements in the test. He
had made observations on curiously shaped skulls in
the Netherlands, in Venice, and in Bologna.

One of the most interesting features of Vesalius's
correspondence as it has been preserved for us, is the
series of dispensations from fasting which were obtained
from him by men of his time. They evidently took
their obligation to fast rather seriously, since they turned
to a physician for a certificate in order to justify their
exemption from it. One of these, sent to the Bishop of
Limoges, shows the formulae that Vesalius most frequently
used. It is, of course, in Latin.

Andreas Vesalius 21

" Whereas the Most Reverend Lord Bishop of Limoges
cannot, without grave danger to his health, which has
been undermined, make the Lenten fast, I, as far as in
me lies, have ordered and conceded the use of flesh to
his Most Reverend Lordship during this Lent. Toledo,
February 18, 1561. — ANDREAS VESALIUS."

With all this interest in practical medicine it cannot
be surprising that Vesalius should have accepted a post
that offered him the widest possible opportunities for
his talents as a physician and surgeon, for it opened up
to him the best consultant practice in Europe. After
Charles had abdicated in favour of his son, Philip II.,
that monarch continued Vesalius in his office, and
proved a faithful friend to him. Some five years later
Vesalius was summoned to France to attend Henry II.,
who had been mortally wounded in the tournament
held in celebration of the dual marriages of his daughter
Elizabeth with Philip and his sister Margaret with
the Duke of Savoy. On Vesalius's arrival at the French
court the king was beyond all medical aid. The point
of a broken lance had entered his right eye, and menin-
gitis had set in with fatal result. Vesalius returned to
Spain shortly afterwards, and was called upon to treat
Philip's son, Don Carlos, for an injury of the head.
Poor Don Carlos, never overstrong mentally, seems after
this not to have quite regained even his former mental
condition, though Vesalius gained great reputation for
the cure that he effected in this case. There are a
number of other details of Vesalius's success as a prac-
titioner of medicine, some of which might not count
for very much in these modern days. He seems on at
least one occasion to have made a prophecy as to the
length of time that a distinguished patient suffering
from a malignant disease would live, and, as the event
justified his prediction, the fame of his knowledge went
far and wide. Modern physicians know too well how
few are the grounds for making such a prophecy with

22 Andreas Vesalius

anything like justifiable accuracy. But success in
practice is not seldom a question of happy accident
rather than of great knowledge, for medical practice is
an art and not a science.

For ten years Vesalius continued in his post of royal
physician, the most considered medical man in all the
world of the time. Few medical investigators of his
day made what they thought significant discoveries
without communicating them in abstract to him, and
he had many correspondents. Then came some factors
not easily to be determined — whether a dissatisfaction
with his occupation, a failure of health in the Spanish
climate, a disagreement with his wife, a homesickness
for the Low Countries, or a desire to get back to his
teaching and investigation in Italy, for all of these are
hinted at by his biographers, and we cannot now decide —
which led to his leaving Spain, and eventually to his
perishing in the island of Zante. We shall leave the
discussion of these till a little later to say something of
Vesalius's state of mind as regards the religious problems
which were agitating the minds of his generation, because
this will serve to throw light on the circumstances of
his death.

The attitude of Vesalius towards religion and religious
principles has met with some curious misinterpretations
on the part of his biographers. Because he was a
scientist and an original investigator in biology, some
of his modern biographers, at least, seem to conclude
from their own feelings in such matters that it would
be quite impossible to imagine that he could have taken
his religion seriously. They transfer the state of mind
of the present time in this matter, which is by no means
shared by all our greatest scientists, back to the middle
of the sixteenth century. They seem entirely to forget
the devout attitude of so many of the great men of that
time towards the Church. Probably the men in Italy
with whom Vesalius was most likely to be brought in

Andreas Vesalius 23

contact intimately, and with some of whom indeed we
know that he was very closely associated, were the
great anatomists and artists. Columbus, Eustachius,
Varolius, Caesalpinus, were all faithful believers in
religious truth. Titian was a great personal friend of
Vesalius. Michel Angelo surely knew of Vesalius's work
and used some of it in his own anatomical studies.
These men, at least his equals in genius, were faithful
adherents of the Church, and did not hesitate to pro-
claim her influence over their lives. It would not be
surprising, then, if Vesalius gave evidence of his faith-
fulness in matters of doctrine and belief.

Realizing this, it is rather hard to understand the
attitude assumed by his biographers with regard to
certain expressions of Vesalius. In the first edition of
his famous book on anatomy, Vesalius had expressed
his reverence for Galen, and had said that he considered
it scarcely wise for him to disagree with this great prince
of teachers. In writing to a friend some time before he
published his book on anatomy, Vesalius had said that
he would as soon doubt of the immortality of the soul
as it is taught " in our most holy religion " (in nostra
sanctissima religione) as doubt of Galen. Roth con-
siders that this is ironically spoken, though, as a matter
of fact, Vesalius never cared to set himself up in opposi-
tion to Galen,1 and even in the last edition of his anatomy,
issued in 1553, he has added very few things that differ
from that old master.

1 The more we know of Galen in the modern time the more
do we learn to appreciate the admiration and the devotion to
him of the medieval and Renaissance scholars. He eminently
deserved it. He made mistakes, but his outlook on the whole
of medicine was marvellously keen and his anticipation of some
of our greatest thoughts almost inexplicable. Fresh air, rest,
good food, especially milk and eggs, as the rations of con-
sumptives, is a typical example. While his works have been
translated into Latin, there is no complete edition in any modern
language, and when we have modern translations we shall think
almost as much of Galen as did the medieval scholars. He was
for medicine what Aristotle was for philosophy.

24 Andreas Vesalius

With regard to another passage in which Vesalius
expresses his agreement with Galen, even though now
it is well known that Galen was wrong on this point, he
also takes occasion to make a remark that seems very
appropriate in the mouth of the Christian anatomist,
and similar to remarks which have often been made by
professors of anatomy, in Italy especially. The passage
is as follows : —

" The septum of the ventricles, composed as I have said
of the thickest substance of the heart, abounds on both
sides with little pits impressed in it. Of these pits,
none so far at least as can be perceived by the senses,
penetrate through from the right into the left ventricle,
so that we are driven to wonder at the handiwork of
the Almighty, by means of which blood sweats from the
right into the left ventricle through passages which
escape human vision."

Of this passage, which seems sufficiently natural and
straightforward, the late Sir Michael Foster says :
" Even in this which he ventured to print, the sarcastic
note of scepticism makes itself heard ; but what he
really thought he did not dare to put forward."

It seems almost supererogatory to protest that it is
extremely difficult to see any good reason for diverting
these passages of Vesalius from the plain and simple
sense which they contain to that of irony. It is the
modern sceptic who puts into Vesalius's words a meaning
that is not justified by the context in which they stand,
nor by what we know of Vesalius's life or of the circum-
stances in which he lived. Some of the thinkers and
writers and artists of the Renaissance had rationalistic
tendencies, but the geniuses of the times were almost
without exception faithful in their adherence to the
authority of the old Church that had stood for so much
in the development of education in the preceding cen-
turies, and whose influence was still thought to be for
good even though there were, as there are always bound

Andreas Vesalius 25

to be, elements of human intolerance in the application
of some of her regulations.

The circumstances of Vesalius's death have been the
subject of no little dispute and of a series of varying
traditions. Studied in the light of the attitude of his
contemporaries to religion, they serve only to bring out
the essentially religious character of the man. It is
known that he resigned his position as court physician
to Philip II. and made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
On his return from this pilgrimage the vessel was wrecked
on the island of Zante, and there Vesalius perished from
hunger and illness. These are the facts. The reasons
for the pilgrimage, however, are in dispute. According
to one physician, Vesalius performed an autopsy on the
body of a person supposed to be dead, but who proved
only to have been in a trance. The matter was reported
to the Spanish Inquisition, and Vesalius is said to
have been condemned to death. This punishment was
changed to the penance of a pilgrimage to the Holy
Land by Philip II. For this explanation of the pil-
grimage there is a letter of the year 1565. It has been
doubted, however, by many subsequent authorities.
The principal difficulty is that such autopsies were not
allowed in Madrid, where Vesalius was at the time,
because of the presence of the Court.

Another explanation is that given by the distinguished
botanist, Carolus Clusius, who gathered his materials
with regard to Vesalius at the Court of Madrid and in
Brussels in the year 1565. According to Clusius, the
Spanish climate did not agree with Vesalius, and he
expressed the desire to return to the Low Countries.
The king did not, however, wish to part with him.
Vesalius fell ill and his life was despaired of. He made
a vow to go to the Holy Land in case of his recovery,
and it was while returning from the fulfilment of this
vow that he died on the Island of Zante.

The story of Vesalius's vow to make a pilgrimage to

26 Andreas Vesalius

the Holy Land is quite in accord with the spirit of the
times. Not a few of his contemporaries, scarcely, if any
less great than himself, had done things not unlike this.
It must be remembered that the spirit of the Crusades
was not yet dead in Europe, and that, within a few
years after Vesalius's death, volunteers were readily
found in all parts of Europe to fight against the Turks
in what was looked upon as a Holy War. The battle
of Lepanto (1571) was fought by true crusaders. So
great a contemporary as Cervantes considered it the
privilege of his lifetime that he had been allowed to
take part in the battle. It is from the feelings of con-
temporaries, as we must insist over and over again, that
the spirit in which a man of a particular time does a
certain action must be judged, not from the point of
view of men of far distant generations, of very different
temper of mind and widely diverse environment and
education.

What constitutes one of the main difficulties in the
acceptance to-day of the story of Vesalius's pilgrimage
to the Holy Land and subsequent death, though told
by the best authority, is undoubtedly the fact that
modern scientific biographers find it difficult to give
credence to the thought that Vesalius when ill should
have made a vow to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy
Land if he recovered from his illness. To certain
modern views as to the efficacy of prayer, this seems
unworthy of a great scientist and original thinker. A
moment's consideration, however, with regard to the
great men of Vesalius's time will make it appear that
this spirit of belief in simple humility was very common
among them. Anyone, for instance, who knows the
life of Columbus, the discoverer of America, would not
be surprised to find such an event in his career. Men
almost, if not quite, as distinguished as Vesalius in the
science of the day did not hesitate openly to express
religious views that would seem quite as obnoxious or

Andreas Vesalius 27

perhaps incredible to the modern materialistic scientist,
or perhaps even to those who, without losing their faith,
have had it sadly dimmed by the persuasive spirit of
the scientific Zeitgeist. The great genius Leonardo da
Vinci, one of the most original thinkers of all time,
dying when Vesalius was five years old, left money for
Masses to be said for his soul and for candles to be burned
before the altar of the Blessed Virgin. Michel Angelo's
sonnet to his crucifix is a proof of a similar state of mind.
Linacre, the best Greek scholar of his time, and one of
the most distinguished physicians, the founder of the
Royal College of Physicians in England, gave up the lucra-
tive and highly honourable position of physician to the
English king, distributed his fortune between the two
universities Oxford and Cambridge and the Royal Col-
lege of Physicians, and became a priest, for " the making
of his soul," during the years when Vesalius was a student
at the University of Louvain. Copernicus, the supreme
astronomical genius of our modern times who literally
gave the world a new universe, a physician as well as
astronomer, always faithfully occupying his post as canon
of the Cathedral of Frauenberg, sometimes exercising
the duties of Chancellor of the Diocese, lived all his life
as a devout minister of religion, and died after special
declarations of his entire submission of all of his writings
to the censorship of the Church. Erasmus, the dis-
tinguished Renaissance scholar, died at Basle not long
before the time when Vesalius made his first visit to
the city, and, though it is often claimed that Erasmus
was in sympathy with the so-called reformers (how he
would have been amused to have the term, as we under-
stand it, seriously applied to him), it must not be for-
gotten that within two years before his death he had
been offered a Cardinal's hat by that stern reforming
pontiff, Paul III., had refused it because of his poor
health, and had asked for the special blessings of the
Pope for his dying hours.

28 Andreas Vesalius

The most natural explanation, then, of Vesalius's
pilgrimage to the Holy Land was that it was in fact an
accomplishment of the vow made while he was ill on
condition that he should recover. This supreme ex-
pression of his religious faith is what might be expected
from the man who had been so long in the counsels of
Charles V., and, later, in those of his son, Philip II. If
there had been any suspicion of the orthodoxy of Vesalius,
Charles, on his retirement to a monastery, would not
have been likely to have recommended him to Philip,
his son and successor. Further, there is a tradition
which we have already mentioned, that though Vesalius
was rather anxious to leave Spain for his native land,
Philip could not be brought to consent to his departure.

In a word, we have in Vesalius's life a type of the
great original thinkers of the Renaissance time, men
who were too broad to harbour the petty materialism
of later scientists, and who remained faithful adherents
of the form of Christianity with which they had been
brought intimately in contact, from which they had
derived many consolations in the trials of life, and to
which their devotion had not been disturbed by the
religious revolt in Germany. Vesalius always remained
what so many of the greatest medical scientists have
been, a sincere and even devout son of the Catholic
Church. His death came probably in the accomplish-
ment of a vow undertaken from religious motives, and
perhaps with the idea of atoning for an unfortunate
taking of human life, for which he could not be held
directly responsible, but with regard to which he did
not feel himself entirely blameless.

NICOLAUS STENSEN

(1638-1687)

SIR BERTRAM WINDLE, M.D., Sc.D., F.R.S., K.S.G.,

President of University College, Corkt and formerly Professor of Anatomy
and Anthropology in the University of Birmingham.

ONE of the objects of the series of which this essay
forms a part is to show how baseless is the accusation
that a love for and a competence in science, and a
devotion to the Catholic Church, cannot possibly
flourish in the same breast. Such is the accusation
often made, indeed regarded as axiomatic, by many
who are misled by the superficially informed writers
of the myriad articles and manuals flourishing for a
day like the ephemeridae and disappearing as rapidly.
As rapidly, but not always as harmlessly, for each may
have left its venom in the mind of some casual reader,
as the mosquito deposits its baneful legacy of malaria
in the blood of its victim. As any one knows who has
ever made a study of the history of science, the state-
ment alluded to above is not only inaccurate, but
ridiculously so. However, " throw enough mud, and
some of it is sure to stick ; " and many well-disposed
persons at the present day do really believe that, if it
had its way, the Catholic Church would shut up every
Laboratory and Institute of Science in the world, and
would place under the ban every person who made any
effort to elucidate the secrets of nature. When one
3 45 i

2 Nicolaus Stensen

asks what ground there is for supposing that the Church
has always been, is, and will always remain the un-
dying enemy of Science, the usual reply is, " Oh,
everybody knows it ! " or if the interlocutor is a little
bit better read, and has actually heard of that
astronomer, " Oh, look at Galileo ! " Here we may be
permitted to turn aside for one moment in order to
remark that if the Church is so persistent a persecutor
of science, it is somewhat strange that, during all the
years through which she enjoyed so great a power,
Galileo should be the one and only instance of perse-
cution which rises to the minds and tongues of men.
It is no part of the scope of this essay to deal with the
case of Galileo, which has already been sufficiently
treated by Fr. Gerard in a penny pamphlet published
by the Catholic Truth Society ; but it may incidentally
be remarked that the late Professor Huxley, who
cannot be accused of any leanings towards the Scarlet
Woman, after having studied the matter, placed it on
record that, in his opinion, " the Pope and Cardinals
had rather the best of it."

Amongst the specific accusations — for though most
of the accusations are general, there actually are some
which are specific — which are made against the
Church is that which alleges that in the person of her
Supreme Pontiffs she has always set herself against
the practice of Human Anatomy, and consequently,
as that science is the foundation of all rational medi-
cine, that she has done what in her lies to prevent any
extension of the knowledge of the healing art, advances
in which have done so much to alleviate the miseries
of man in this valley of tears. With this accusation
we shall deal in a moment, but before turning to its
consideration we may further state that geology is
a science which is supposed to be specially inimical to
the Church, or rather towards which the Church is

Nicolaus Stensen 3

especially inimical, from some sort of wild idea that geo-
logical discoveries conflict with her religious principles.

The life of the subject of this essay is an absolute
confutation of both of these accusations. Probably
ninety- nine per cent, of the persons who prattle about
Religion and Science have never heard of Nicolaus
Stensen, but his name and his fame, great in his own
day, still shine bright in the estimation of all men of
science, and the incidents of his career with some notice
of the discoveries for which he was responsible may
well afford food for thought on the prefatory remarks
just made.

But before turning to Stensen it may be well to
devote a few moments to considering the question of
anatomy alluded to above. Here is a definite accusa-
tion often made in print ; is there any ground for it ?

For a reply to this question — a full reply — the reader
may be referred to the erudite works of Professor
J. J. Walsh, of Fordham University, New York, to
which the present writer unhesitatingly and gratefully
acknowledges his obligations for most of the facts
and many of the quotations which will be found in this
paper. Briefly stated things stand thus. There is a
Bull of Benedict VIII, u De Sepulturis," issued in 1300,
which deals with the cutting-up of dead bodies, and
on which the whole of this accusation is based, and, so
it would appear, based by those who cannot have taken
the trouble to study the Bull itself.1 The circumstances
which called for the Bull were connected with the
Crusades. It was the very natural wish of many
Crusaders that, should they perish far from their own
country, their bodies should be conveyed home in order

1 The Latin of this Bull, with a full account of the whole
question, will be found in Professor Walsh's work, The Popes and
Science, an edition of which is published by the Catholic Truth
Society, price 2s. 6d.

4 Nicolaus Stensen

to be buried in their own family surroundings. Just
imagine what the carrying out of such a request on
behalf of a number of large-bodied warriors must have
meant at that day ! In most cases they probably could
not embalm them ; ships were small and usually over-
crowded, and not to be had at any particular moment ; in
a word, not to prolong unpleasant considerations, there
were a host of practical difficulties in the way of carrying
out the requests of the dead Crusaders. Hence their
survivors, casting about for some easy means of bring-
ing something home for interment, adopted the horrible
practice of cutting up the dead, boiling the flesh off the
bones, and taking these, and these alone, home for
burial. It was this practice that Boniface VIII forbad,
and that fact is clearly proved by the opening lines
of the Bull itself : " Corpora defunctorum exenter-
nantes, et ea immaniter decoquentes, ut ossa a carnibus
separata ferant sepelienda in terram suam, ipso facto
sunt excommunicati." z

There is a rejoinder to this by those who have studied
the Bull that, though it was originally meant to apply to
the case of the Crusaders, it was afterwards and also ap-
plied to that of the study of human anatomy. Let us
see how this statement fits in with the facts. One of the
first things which a medical student learns is that there
are scores of things in the human body which are
known by the names of the men who described them
first or who get the credit of first describing them.
Some of these rather obscure persons would never have
been heard of but for the fact that they have managed to
get their names attached to some object — often a very
obvious but sometimes a very trivial object — in the

1 " Persons cutting up the bodies of the dead, barbarously boiling
them, in order that the bones, being separated from the flesh, may
be carried for burial into their own countries, are by the very act
excommunicated . '

Nicolaus Stensen 5

human body. Indeed, subsequent anatomists must
often have envied the cheapness with which immortality
could be purchased at the earlier stages of the history
of their subject. If — as is not too often the case — the
medical student further inquires as to who these persons
were whose names have thus become known to him, he
will not be long before he finds out that a very large
number of them were Italians and flourished in Italy at
a time when the Popes held sway over a considerable
portion of that part of Europe and exercised a con-
trolling influence at least over the rest of it. A still
deeper probing into the facts will show that some of
these, and by no means the least distinguished of them,
were actually hardy enough to be Professors of Anatomy
in the Papal City of Rome itself and fortunate enough
to possess the friendship and patronage of the Popes
themselves.

Two examples will suffice, and each shall be a man
whose name at least is known to every medical student
of the third year. Bartholomaeus Eustachius described
the air-passage which leads from the back of the throat
into the middle ear. Let the reader pause for a
moment and perform the following perfectly safe
evolutions : Take a deep breath ; shut the mouth ; hold
the nose tight ; try hard to breathe out. The result will
be that the drums of the ears will be felt to be deflected
externally from the rush of air up the Eustachian tube, as
it has been called ever since Bartholomaeus Eustachius,
who died Professor of Medicine in Rome in 1574, first
described it. It is perfectly clear that in order to
describe it he must have first dissected it, and from the
nature of the case probably dissected it many times,
before he had found out all about it. At about the
same period flourished Constantius Varolius, by whose
name is still known a very important part of the brain
called the Pons Varolii, which certainly could never

49 I*

6 Nicolaus Stensen

be seen by human eye without dissection. Goelicke, in
his Historia Anatomiae, says of Varolius, " Constantius
Varolius, Bononiensis, qui primum in Academia Patria
professionem Chirurgicam habuit, deinde vero in aulam
Romanam, Gregorio XIII, Pontificatum tenente, evoca-
tus et Papae Archiater constitutus est, simulque in Archi
lycaeo Romano Anatomiae professionem suscepit ; " '
and he then goes on to describe his connection with
the Pons, as just mentioned, and to state that he first
described the optic nerves. It is clear, then, that in the
sixteenth century anatomy was going on in Rome under
the favour of the Pope. But our opponents have not
yet done, and their last ditch is a statement that
between 1300 and 1550, two hundred and fifty years
had rolled by — which we do not dispute — and that the
Bull had lost effect in that time. In passing one may
say that this scarcely fits in with " Rome's unbending,
rigid, unchanging ways " as sternly reprehended by the
same critics ; but let that pass.

Neither does it fit in with the facts of the case.
Mondino, who was an early writer on anatomy — one
cannot call him the first writer, for the first book that
we know of was on anatomy and its author was an
Egyptian king — but a very early writer, was a Bolognese
and published a dissecting manual which was in use
for two centuries after his death in the early part of the
fourteenth century. There is no kind of question that
he did dissect some bodies. Our opponents, who cannot
deny this fact, try to make out, from a statement which,
it may be added, in no way bears out their contentions,
that he only dissected three — still, if that were true, he
did dissect three and had the audacity to publish the

1 Constantius Varolius, of Bologna, first in the University of his
home Professor of Surgery, was then called to Rome, Gregory
XIII being Pope, and was made chief physician to the Pope and
at the same time Professor of Anatomy in the Roman University.

Nicolaus Stensen 7

results in the teeth of what it is urged were the provisions
of the Bull. As a matter of fact, Guy de Chauliac, who
studied anatomy in Bologna under Mondino's successor,
Bertrucius, when he came to write his own work, La
Grande Chirurgie, stated that Mondino had done many
dissections — " et ipsam fecit multitoties."

So much for this accusation, which could never have
been made by any one conversant with the Bull and
with the history and practice of anatomy. Let us now
turn to the remarkable story of Nicolaus Stensen, which
presents so many surprising features that it reads more
like a tale than a sober piece of reality.

Nicolaus Stensen was born in Copenhagen in 1638
on January 2oth. His parents were Lutherans, as
were the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants.
His father was a goldsmith, but died when Nicolaus
was young, when his mother married another of the
same craft.

As the son grew up he received a wide general educa-
tion, and became a student in the University of Copen-
hagen, where he turned his attention to medical studies.
At that time, and indeed for many years, the anatomical
chair at Copenhagen had been held by one or other
member of the family of Bartholin, a name well known in
anatomical text-books — one of them by a curious coin-
cidence having his name attached to a salivary duct, as
was the case with Stensen. Whilst a medical student,
Stensen, as if it were designed that he should make ex-
periments in all sorts of ways of living, actually had to
become a soldier, for his city, being besieged by the
Swedes, a regiment of students, known as " the black
coats " from the colour of their clothes, was formed,
and amongst the names of those composing it is to
beiound that of Stensen. After three years at Copen-
hagen, Stensen, according to the custom of those days,

8 Nicolaus Stensen

migrated to Amsterdam, where one Blasius — who has
somehow or other escaped having his name attached to
anything known to me — was then anatomist. Whilst
he was actually a student here Stensen discovered the
duct of the parotid gland, which has ever since been
called after him, " the duct of Stensen," or " ductus
Stenonianus " from Steno, the Latin form of his name.
The history of this matter may here be dealt with,
though the full account of his services to anatomy
will be reserved for a later part of this paper. The
Encyclopedia Britannica (ed. xi), not very accurately
as we think, says that Stensen "re-discovered" the
duct of the parotid, though there is no statement
which I have been able to find respecting the actual
discoverer of that passage. The reader may now relax
himself by another physiological experiment on his own
body. Let him clench his teeth tightly and rub his
fingers up and down over the central part of the large
muscle which lies in front of his ear. He will feel
a structure rolling under his fingers something like
a piece of whipcord, and if he pursues the opera-
tion for a few seconds he will be conscious of a flow of
saliva into his mouth. The structure which he has been
rolling under his fingers is Stensen's duct, and the flow
of saliva has come from the largest of the salivary glands
— the parotid — which lies in front of the ear and in part
on the muscle of which we have been speaking, the
masseter.

As we have said, when Stensen made this discovery,
which had been preceded by the discovery of the duct
of the sub-maxillary, another salivary gland, by Whar-
ton, an English anatomist, he was a student of Blasius,
and Blasius, perhaps scenting immortality, made claim
to be the real discoverer. It is possibly to this claim
that the Encyclopaedia is alluding, but it would seem
to be perfectly untenable. First of all there is the fact

Nicolaus Stensen g

that Blasius in a book now long forgotten described the
parotid as an organ whose function it was to keep the
ear warm, which one cannot suppose that he would
have done had he ever understood what the duct was.
Secondly, there is the statement made by Bartholin of
Copenhagen, who wound up the controversy by writing
to Stensen his former pupil : —

" Your assiduity in investigating the secrets of the
human body, as well as your fortunate discoveries, are
highly praised by the learned of your country. The
fatherland congratulates itself upon such a citizen, I
upon such a pupil, through whose efforts anatomy
makes daily progress, and our lymphatic vessels are
traced out more and more. You divided honours with
Wharton, since you have added to his internal duct an
external one, and have thereby discovered the sources
of the saliva concerning which many have hitherto
dreamed much, but which no one has (permit the
expression) pointed out with the finger. Continue, my
Steno, to follow the path to immortal glory which
true anatomy holds out to you."

This definite statement we may take it disposes of
Blasius and establishes Stensen as the first discoverer
of the duct named after him. From this period date
those further and even more important anatomical dis-
coveries of which mention will be made at a later
part of this paper.

We have now to describe Stensen's sojourn in
Italy and his conversion to the Catholic Church. With
respect to this and the further movements of Stensen
there is some discrepancy in the various accounts
given of his career. For example, the Encyclopedia
Britannica (ed. xi, sub voce Steno) says, "After a
period of travel he settled in Italy (1666) first as
Professor of Anatomy at Padua, and then in Florence
as house physician to the Grand Duke Ferdinand II

io Nicolaus Stensen

of Tuscany. He returned to his native city in 1672
to become Professor of Anatomy, but having turned
Roman Catholic, he found it expedient to return to
Florence, and was ultimately made Apostolic Vicar of
Lower Saxony." The whole article — a very short one
— on Stensen is very inaccurate, and the slovenly
statement, " having turned a Roman Catholic," &c.,
would certainly be taken by most readers to mean
that, having become a Catholic in Copenhagen whilst
occupying the Chair of Anatomy in that city, he found
it expedient to leave. This in no way represents the
facts of the case. Again, in the very excellent and
laudatory account of Stensen's geological work given
by Professor McKenny Hughes1 there is the following
statement, " In Paris he (sc. Stensen) became intimate
with Thevenot, and here also he made the acquaint-
ance of Bossuet. The eloquence and earnestness of
that remarkable prelate had such an effect upon Steno
that in 1667 he went over to the Catholics, which
perhaps helped somewhat to secure for him the warm
reception accorded to him by the Grand Duke Fer-
dinand II and his brother Leopold."

This again would seem to be an imperfect account
of the facts. He settled in Florence in 1666, as the
writer just quoted admits ; as he also states, he did not
become a Catholic until 1667. It is not quite clear,
then, why the Grand Duke should have welcomed him
as a Catholic some time before he joined the Church.

Professor Walsh gives an account which is evidently
the result of careful research, which sets forth the facts
in a simple and intelligible manner, and which we shall
follow in this paper.2 After the completion of his studies
Stensen hoped to have been appointed Professor of
Anatomy in Copenhagen, but was, for the time, disap-

1 Nature, March 23, 1882.

a It will be found in his Catholic Churchmen in Science.

Nicolaus Stensen 1 1

pointed, the appointment going to Jacobson, also a
man of real distinction. Stensen left his home and
went to Paris, where he worked for some years, and
subsequently to Italy, which he reached in 1665. In
the next year he is heard of in Rome, but shortly
migrated to Florence, where he was made body phy-
sician (the term " house physician " used by the writer
in the Encyclopedia Britannica is applicable to a young
man in an English hospital, but not to the kind of
position held by Stensen), and further was appointed
physician to the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova. As
both of these appointments fell to his share before he
became a Catholic a picture of toleration is brought
before our eyes very different from that summoned
up by those writers whose object it is to depict
Catholic countries as unwilling to admit non-Catholics
to any share in the good things which may be going.
Stensen's conversion arose directly from his connection
with the hospital just mentioned. The apothecary's
department connected with the institution, which was
necessarily frequently visited by Stensen, was under
the charge of a nun, Sister Maria Flavia, who may
be looked upon as a kind of head woman- dispenser.
Stensen may have been disposed to look favourably
upon the claims of the Church from what he had seen
and heard of Bossuet whilst in Paris, and from what
we gather of his character from his writings there can
be little doubt that his personality would be very
attractive to those with whom he came in contact.
Sister Maria Flavia, at any rate, made up her mind
to make a convert of the distinguished young phy-
sician, and, as one might expect, inaugurated her
campaign by constant prayers for that intention. She
followed this up by inducing him to consider and even
to participate in a number of Catholic practices, and
finally she brought him into contact with a priest with

12 Nicolaus Stensen

the result that, his difficulties having been cleared
away, he was received into the Church. Sister Maria
Flavia had been just about the same number of years
in religion as Stensen had been alive when he became
a convert, but she lived to receive the first blessing
that he gave to any one after being consecrated a
Bishop, and even wrote, at the direction of her con-
fessor, a short account of Stensen's conversion.

It was after this event that Stensen received the offer
of the Chair of Anatomy in Copenhagen. Seeing the
important positions which he had secured in Florence,
the Catholic surroundings and the beauty of the place,
one may well wonder that Stensen should have ac-
cepted the invitation which he had so much desired
at an earlier part of his career. It may have been, as
has been suggested, that he hoped that he might be
able to induce some of his fellow-countrymen to look
with a less prejudiced eye upon the religion which
he had come to love. At any rate, the offer was
accepted and Stensen returned to the scenes of his
student life. However, his stay there was of no very
great length ; the toleration which he as a Protestant
had experienced in Catholic Florence does not seem to
have been extended to him as a Catholic in Protestant
Copenhagen. One rather wonders that the invitation
was ever given. In any case, Stensen resigned his posi-
tion and returned to Italy, where various posts were at
his disposal. None of these, however, attracted him,
for he had made up his mind, in the height of his fame,
to enter Holy Orders, which he did as soon as he had
made the necessary preparations for the solemn cere-
monies of ordination to the priesthood. From the state-
ment of his contemporary, the Cardinal Archbishop of
Florence, it is clear that Stensen was a man of great
sanctity of life, for he says (as quoted by Professor
Walsh, from whom, as I have said, most of my quota-

Nicolaus Stensen 13

tions are taken), " Already as a member of a Protestant
sect he had lived a life of innocence and had practised
all the moral virtues. After his conversion he had
marked out for himself so severe a method of life and
had remained so true to it that in a very short time he
reached a high degree of perfection."

Stensen's first years as a priest were spent in Italy,
and during this time his great fame as a man of learn-
ing brought him in contact by correspondence or other-
wise with many of the distinguished men of the day,
Spinoza and Leibnitz being two outstanding examples.
It was during this time also that he devoted himself to
those studies in geology which form the foundation of
all modern ideas in connection with that science and
rendered him, even in his own day, as illustrious a
man in that branch of knowledge as he had previously
made himself in anatomy.

All this peaceful life of study was, however, to come
to an end ; for, at the request of the Duke of Hanover,
most reluctantly — indeed only after he had been put
under holy obedience — he was consecrated a bishop for
that part of Germany. As has already been told, the
first action which he performed after his consecration,
was to write to Sister Maria Flavia and send her his
benediction, she having, under Almighty God, been the
instrument of his conversion. Every convert knows
that there is a certain type of mind which cannot credit
an honest conversion — an awful self-revelation ! — and
feels quite sure that money or the hope of a beautiful
bride or some other mundane temptation has been the
inducement to a step which, so it would appear, no man
in his senses would otherwise have taken. Every one
of us who is a convert and outside the workhouse
knows very well this kind of thing, and one feels con-
vinced that Stensen, had many wagging fingers pointed
at him when he was raised to the episcopal dignity.

14 Nicolaus Stensen

"A fat bishopric," that is the elegant way in which
certain lewd journals of the baser sort would put it
nowadays. Well, Stensen made little of temporal profit
from his new dignity. He utterly refused the carriage
which the Duke wished to provide for him ; he would
not even have servants, in the ordinary sense of the
word, in his house, for the few persons who lived with
him and shared the household duties were converts
with whom he lived on terms of perfect equality. And
when this occupant of two " fat bishoprics " came to
die there was not even enough money forthcoming to
pay for his burial. All that he had, besides his clothes,
were his episcopal cross and ring and a few relics of
SS. Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, and Philip Neri,
which he held in great veneration.

There is another idea entertained about most — probably
all — converts, as again we who have been through
the mill know, and that is the idea that they are very
unhappy where they are, and are either on the point of
coming back to the fair fields of Protestantism from the
dark prison of Popery or would do so if their pride
would let them confess what a terrible mistake they
had made. These kindly remarks — for, unlike the first-
named suggestions, they are often meant to be quite
kindly and are made by those in whose hearts is a real
friendship for the unfortunate convert — may well have
been made concerning Stensen, and it may be well to
give his own account of his feelings towards the reli-
gion which he had embraced in the full vigour of his
manhood. Writing to a friend he says, <( To-morrow
I shall finish, God willing, the eighteenth year of my
happy life as a member of the Church. I wish to
acknowledge once more my thankfulness for the part
which you took under God in my conversion. As I
hope to have the grace to be thankful to Him for ever,
so I sigh for the opportunity to express my thankfulness

Nicolaus Stensen 15

to you and your family. I can feel that my own in-
gratitude toward God, my slowness in His service, make
me unworthy of His graces ; but I hope that you who
have helped me to enter His service will not cease to
pray, so that I may obtain pardon for the past and
grace for the future, in order in some measure to repay
all the favours that have been conferred on me."

Hanover and Hamburg, where Stensen lived for a
time, did not afford, as he thought, much chance for
missionary labours, and what could be done was being
admirably done by the Fathers of the Society of Jesus.
Hence when the Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin be-
came a Catholic and asked that Stensen might be sent
to him as a Bishop the request was complied with,
and in hard missionary work in that part of Germany
Stensen spent the remainder of his life. It is sad to
have to say it, but his labours seem to have borne but
little fruit according to the judgement of this world, at
any rate in conversions. In this apparent waste of a life
— one must emphasize the word " apparent," for who but
Almighty God can say whether there was waste or was
not ? — there is a certain parallel between Stensen and
another great Catholic man of science — Mendel. Mendel
was torn away from his monumental work to become
Abbot of Brunn, and his labours as a scientific inquirer
came to an end. At what reward ? Apparently at
none, for the rest of his life is a tale of struggle for the
rights of his Abbey, a struggle for which a less valuable
life might have equally well sufficed. And Stensen
was cut off from his never finished geological task to
spend a life of labour with, as we have said, but little
apparent fruit.

What both of them did, however, was to present a
splendid example of sense of duty over-riding evident
desire and obvious fitness for another and totally
different line of life. After Stensen's death the Medici

1 6 Nicolaus Stensen

family, remembering the man who had once been an
ornament of their city and had there received the gift
of Faith, begged his body and had it interred in San
Lorenzo in Florence. The tablet then set up is more
concerned, as will be seen, with his religious than with
his scientific history ; it was left for later comers in a
distant century to set up a second inscription (both
are given at the end of this paper) commemorating his
great position in the world of science. To the works
which gained him this position we must now turn our
attention. They divide themselves quite simply and
naturally into two groups both by subject and by time.
There are the earlier group of anatomical observations
made partly in the north and partly in the south of
Europe, and all, or nearly all, of them in his Lutheran
days. Then there is the second group of geological
writings carried out in Italy and after he had entered
the Catholic Church.

Amongst the anatomical group attention has already
been drawn to his discovery of the duct of the parotid
gland, because it is on account of this duct that his
name is chiefly known and, it would seem, will always
be known. But it is not his most important contribu-
tion ^to science, not even to anatomical science. The
contribution, so far as that group goes, of really prime
importance was his discovery that the heart is a muscle.
" The heart a muscle ! What else could it be ? " will
be the exclamation which will rise to the lips of many
when they read this statement. It is easy so to think
now, but let us just picture how things were when
Stensen made his discovery. Histology, or the science
of the tissues, was a field of knowledge quite unexplored;
physiology, in any proper sense of the word, almost
equally unknown ; even the fact of the circulation of
the blood was only slowly making its way into the
minds of men. Harvey, one of England's greatest

Nicolaus Stensen 17

men, Harvey who — how difficult to imagine it ! — was
actually tutor to Charles II and James II when boys,
and was engaged in teaching them in a neighbouring
field whilst the Battle of Edgehill was being fought —
Harvey was the man who first proclaimed the fact
that the blood circulated throughout the body. But
Harvey's views were looked upon as a mere chimaera
by many, and it required two further discoveries to
establish them. Arteries and veins, the passages by
which blood comes from or returns to the heart, are
easy of demonstration and can be seen by anybody,
but how does the blood get from the arteries to the
veins? Everybody nowadays knows that this takes
place through a series of fine tubes, invisible save to
the microscope, which are called capillaries. Every-
body knows it now, but nobody knew it until Malpighi,
a contemporary of Stensen's, made the discovery. Then,
in the next place, what is it that drives the blood to rush
upon its constantly recurring course ? Every one now
knows that it is the contraction of that great muscle,
the heart, but nobody knew it until Stensen proclaimed
the fact and with it gave the key to the motive power
of the circulation. This was not the only piece of
work in myology, or the science of muscles, in which
Stensen engaged, for, in fact, he wrote largely on this
branch of anatomy. Further he gave accurate and
original descriptions of the blood-vessels of the nose
and also of the lachrymal gland, the gland which pro-
duces tears, and its passages. If Stensen had never
done anything else, in anatomy he had earned for
himself a place amongst the immortals. But he was to
add a far greater glory to this. In anatomy he had
been a member — a very brilliant member, but still only
one member — of a band of discoverers who were then
creating a solid science, but in geology he was to be
a pioneer and the father of his science, the author of what

1 8 Nicolaus Stensen

the Germans aptly call a " bahnbrechenden Werke,"
the layer of the foundation on which all subsequent
geological work stands. That these high-sounding
words are not mere empty praise, the outcome of
religious partisanship, must now be proved.

First of all, we must try to understand the state of
opinion when Stensen began his labours. Take the
case of fossils. Of course their existence had been
recognised ; fossil sharks' teeth were found in quantities
in Italian deposits, and especially in Malta, where tradi-
tion alleged that they were the teeth of the snakes
which were deprived of them by St. Paul. But as
to the nature of fossils there was no proper explana-
tion. One school of writers believed that these objects
had been created just as they were found, they were
" lapides sui generis," things which never had been
different from that which they now were, freaks or
superfluities of creation. Another group, coming nearer
to a recognition of their real character, believed that
they had originally been portions of living things, but
that their position and condition were due to the terrific
catastrophe of the Noachian deluge, which was re-
garded also as responsible for many features of
physical geology. Still another group conceived that
the fossils, originally belonging to living creatures,
had been buried by eruptions from volcanoes. Of
course, the rocks in which they are found are never
volcanic, but one must remember that petrology was
hardly in its infancy at this time. Now Stensen had
dissected and published an account of a shark captured
off Leghorn in 1667, and had paid especial attention to
the nature of its teeth, so that when his attention was
directed to the fossil examples of a similar species he
was in a position to grasp their meaning readily. It
was then that he set himself to write a treatise for
the Delia Cruscan Academy, of which unfortunately

Nicolaus Stensen 19

he never achieved more than the introduction, in which
he intended to lay down his views on geology. This
introduction is entitled " De solido intra solidum natura-
liter contento Dissertationis Prodromus." It was pub-
lished in quarto at Florence in 1669, and is not
merely an introduction to the work which was never
destined to appear, but is the introduction to all the
many volumes which have since been written on
geology.

Dealing first of all with the question of fossils, as that
has already been alluded to, Stensen lays down this
basic law, applicable not only to them, but to other
geological facts, that " if a given body of definite form,
produced according to the laws of nature, be carefully
examined, it will show in itself the place and manner of
its origin." Now, applying this to the case of fossils,
Stensen showed first of all that these were the remains
of living things, claiming that even if sea-shells were
not known to exist nowadays, yet one must believe that
the fossil examples had belonged to living creatures.
Then he showed that whilst some of the fossil shells
were found just as they had been left, others had
suffered a replacement of their structure, whilst others
again were only represented by casts of what had been
shells. Finally, as to their position, he argued that one
must think of the shells and their surroundings and
argue from them to the manner of their deposition
just as one would do about any other collocation of
objects. For example, he says that if we found a
collection of sea-salt, planks of ships, and marine
animals we should argue that the sea had been there,
even if we were unable to decide whether the reason
that it was not there now was because the land had
been raised or the sea had been lowered. And, again,
he says that if we find charred pieces of wood and
other objects of the same kind we argue that there has

2O Nicolaus Stensen

been a fire. It is obvious to any one who considers the
matter that in this argument he lays the foundation of
all later geology, and of the greater portion of pre-
historic archaeology also. But his discourse is not
confined to the subject of fossils. He deals, and for
the first time scientifically, with the subject of stratifica-
tion. The examination of the natural object with the
idea of discovering how it was formed led him to
formulate the theory of the deposition of aqueous
rocks. "The powdery layers of the earth's surface,"
he says, " must necessarily at some time have been held
in suspension in water, from which they were precipi-
tated by their own weight. The movement of the fluid
scattered the precipitate here and there, and gave to it
a level surface." And again, " Bodies of considerable
circumference which are found in the various layers of
the earth, followed the laws of gravity as regards their
position and their relations to one another. The
powdery material of the earth's strata took on so
completely the form of the bodies which it surrounded
that even the smallest apertures became filled up, and
the powdery layer fitted accurately to the surface of the
object, and even took something of its polish."

If they were laid down in water such strata must
necessarily have originally been horizontal. Stensen
recognized this fact, and of course also recognised that,
so far trom being horizontal, many aqueous rocks are
tilted, contorted, and otherwise altered from their
original position, and this he accounted for, much as
we account for it now, by disruptions through volcanic
effort and by the collapsing of cavernous spaces under-
ground. Such changes of the contour of the earth
naturally led him to consider the question of mountains.
" All the mountains which we see now," he says,
" have not existed since the beginning of things."
Yet, on the other hand, mountains do not grow like

Nicolaus Stensen 21

plants, nor do they all run in certain directions, as
some had claimed. Pursuing this subject, he shows
that mountains with flat tops are made up both of
horizontal and inclined strata, and that regions where
mountains exist are raised and depressed, and are
subject to rending and fissuring. From this he passes
to the question of springs, and shows that one of the
effects of the dislocation of strata to which he called
attention was the opening of fissures through which
internal collections of water could escape. He en-
deavoured to reduce the strata of Tuscany to six
periods, and thought that these might be demonstrated
also in other parts of the world. Further, he fully
recognized and was not afraid to claim that immense
ages must be granted for the carrying out of the pro-
cesses which he postulated.

Any one who is acquainted even superficially with
modern geology will see how closely these views
resemble many of its teachings. What they have to
remember is that these views were now formulated for
the first time, and that, if they remained comparatively
unknown for some time, that must in large measure
be due to the fact that Stensen " left his tale half-told."
There is another resemblance between Mendel and
himself in the fact that Mendel's epoch-making dis-
coveries slumbered for years in the pages of an obscure
publication till rediscovered in our own days. If Sten-
sen's theories took their time in conquering the world,
they did conquer it ; for every writer on geology has
conceded to him the honour which is so justly his due.

In a previous portion of this paper the fact has been
mentioned that the Medici placed over his tomb an in-
scription commemorative rather of his piety than of his
scientific fame. In 1881 the International Congress of
Geologists met in Bologna and, after the sessions of
their body had come to an end, the members paid a visit

22 Nicolaus Stensen

to Florence in order to see the tomb of one to whom
their science owed so much. They also placed there a
tablet on which, quite naturally, they insist upon his
fame as a man of science. The inscription and its
translation appear at the end of this paper. Here
surely is a striking object lesson as to the possible
relations between Religion and Science. Stensen was a
man of indubitable piety : that may be gathered from
what has gone before. He forsook everything to
follow his Master, and what a sacrifice that must have
been none can realize but those who have known the
fascination of scientific research and the pang that
pierces the heart when cut off from it. He lived a life
of apostolic poverty and mortification. He advanced
far-reaching theories as to geology, widely differing
from those held at that day, and straining almost — as it
would then seem — the beliefs of the orthodox. Some
writers of the present day say that he advanced these
views with caution because he was afraid of the Church
and her terrors. It is not too much to say that if he
had not been a Catholic these same writers would
have lauded to the skies his scientific caution in not
going one step beyond what he believed he could
completely prove. The fact remains that he did
advance these views without any reserve, and that the
only torture which the Church inflicted upon him — no
doubt it was a heavy burden to be borne — was that of
making him a bishop and sending him out to work
" in partibus infidelium," and, as one may well say, " in
terra deserta et inaquosa."

The visitor to the University of Glasgow, an institu-
tion which will not feel it an insult to be described as a
centre of ardent Protestantism, cannot but feel a shock
of surprise when he enters the Senate Room and finds
that the central object of interest over the fireplace is a
well-executed relief of a Pope crowned with the tiara.

Nicolaus Stensen 23

Thus the University does honour to its founder, Nicholas
V, who by his Bull — under the authority of which the
University still exists — in 1450 first established that cele-
brated seat of learning. In like manner at the University
of Copenhagen amongst the portraits of dead and gone
celebrities — some now long forgotten — the visitor may
experience the same kind of shock in coming across
the portrait of a Catholic bishop. His delicate,
thoughtful, rather sad face is surmounted by the biretta,
and his right hand, with its episcopal ring, fingers
the pectoral cross which hangs upon his breast. It
is the portrait of Bishop Stensen, one of the greatest of
the glories of the Academy of which he was once a
student and for a short time a Professor ; a man who
walked with God and studied His creation whilst on
earth, who departed this life in the odour of sanctity,
and who has — can one doubt it ? — by now received the
reward of the man who forsakes father and mother and
all things earthly to follow the light which shines upon
his path.

THE TABLETS ALLUDBD TO ON p. 16.

A. The Original Tablet.

Nicolai Stenonis Episcopi Titopolitani Viri Deo Pleni Quidquid
Mortale Fuit Hie Situm Est. Dania Genuit Heterodoxum Etruria
Orthodoxum Roma Virtute Probatum Sacris Infulis Insignavit
Saxonia Inferior Kortem Evangelii Assertorem Agnovit Demum
Diuturnis Pro Christo Laboribus Aerumnisque Confectum Sverium
Desideravit Ecclesia deflevit Florentia Sibi Restitui Saltern In
Cineribus Voluit. A.D. 1687.

Whatever was mortal of Nicholas Stensen, Bishop of Titopolis,
a man full of God, lies here. Denmark brought him forth a
heretic, Tuscany a convert, Rome, his virtue being proved, deco-
rated him with the sacred mitre, Lower Saxony recognized a brave
preacher of the gospel. Then, worn out by daily labours for
Christ and by tribulations, Schwerin lamented him. The Church
sorrowed for him. Florence desired that at least his ashes should
be restored to her. A.D. 1687

24 Nicolaus Stensen

B. The Tablet erected in 1881.

Nicolae Stenonsis Imaginem Vides Hospes Quam Acre Collate
Docti Amplius Mille Ex Universe Terrarum Orbe Insculpendam
Curarunt In Memoriam Ejus Diei iv Cal Octobr. An. MDCCCLXXXI
Quo Geologi Post Conventum Bononiae Habitum Praeside Joannio
Capellinio Equite Hue Peregrinanti Sunt Atque Adstantibus Legatis
Flor Municipii et R. Instituti Altiorum Doctrinarum Cineres Viri
Inter Geologos Et Anatomicos Praestantissimi In Hujus Templi
Hypogaeo Laurea Corona Honoris Gratique Animi Ergo hone-
staverunt.

You behold here, traveller, the bust of Nicolas Stensen, as it
was set up by more than a thousand scientific men drawn from
the whole world, as a memorial to him on the fourth of the
Kalends of October 1881. The geologists of the world, after their
meeting at Bologna, under the presidency of Count John Capellini,
made a pilgrimage to his tomb, and in the presence of the chosen
representatives of the municipality, and of the learned professors
of the University, honoured the mortal ashes of this man, most
illustrious amongst both geologists and anatomists.

ALOISIO (LUIGI) GALVANI

ALOISIO (LUIGI) GALVANI (1737-1798)

AND SOME OTHER CATHOLIC ELECTRICIANS

WILLIAM BERGIN, M.A., M.R.I.A.,
Professor of Experimental Physics in University College, Cork.

To become a byword is not usually regarded as a very
creditable performance, and the man who incurs that
fate is not generally thought to be a fit subject for con-
gratulations. No one, for example, would crave the
position of originating the verb " to burke/' and no one
also would care to endure the unpleasantnesses which
fell to the lot of its god-father in order to go down to
history as the cause of the addition of the word " boy-
cott " to the English language.

But as there are inglorious ways of becoming a by-
word, so also there are glorious methods. To have one's
name attached for ever by brothers in science to the
name of some epoch-making discovery is certainly no
discreditable method of ensuring immortality for one's
reputation. In the great field of physical science many
men's names will be found attached to " laws " or dis-
coveries of various kinds, and it is of some of these that
this paper proposes to treat, pointing out at the
same time the remarkable fact that a group of the most
distinguished of them were almost all Catholics, and that
those who were not were men of undoubted piety and of
firm attachment to Christian principles. This statement is
4 69 I

2 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

certainly opposed to the idea which has been so often
put forward of recent years, that Science and Christianity
are opposed to one another, but it remains, nevertheless,
a fact, as will be readily seen from what is to follow.
Galvani's name has been chosen as the chief example,
not because he was the greatest of all the band of elec-
tricians of whom we have to speak, but because the
words derived from his name are probably in more
general use than those which have originated from the
names of the other discoverers, on whose achievements
we shall briefly touch.

" Galvanism " first came into the world as a kind of
alternative word for what we more commonly call elec-
tricity, and was the first derivation from the name
Galvani. Then manufacturers took up the matter and
discovered the plan of coating one metal with another
by electrical methods, and thus arose the verb " to
galvanize." Finally, — and this shows the complete in-
corporation of the word into the language — it even
begins to take on a derived or metaphorical meaning,
and we hear of a body of indignant constituents " galvan-
izing into activity " their slothful representative in
Parliament. As has been already said, Galvani, the
consideration of whose life-history we defer for a short
time, was only one of the discoverers dignified by science
with terminological honours.

When we read of a " voltaic battery " or, as we so
commonly do in these days of electrical power, of a
" volt/' we are doing homage to the memory of one of
the greatest, if not the greatest of all the electrical
pioneers, Alessandro Volta (1745-1827), of whose dis-
covery of the electrical " pile " so great a man of science
as Arago says that it is " the most wonderful instrument
that has ever come from the hand of man, not excluding
even the telescope or the steam-engine." Now, in addi-
tion to his greatness as an electrical discoverer, as to
which it is neither possible nor indeed necessary to say

and some other Catholic Electricians 3

more here, Volta was a most devout and convinced
Catholic. Towards the end of his career he retired to a
country house near Como, and, as Professor Walsh says,
whilst living there his piety " became a sort of proverb
among the country people. Every morning at an early
hour, in company with his servant, he could be seen,
with bowed head, making his way to the church. Here
he heard Mass, and usually the office of the day, in which
all the canons of the cathedral took part. He had a
special place on the Epistle side of the altar, not far
from the organ. His favourite method of prayer was
the rosary." His own confession of faith, which he
drew up and signed in 1815, that is to say, twelve years
before he died, is conclusive. This confession was drawn
up by himself and without suggestion from anybody,
because some tattlers had spread the story that he
attended to his religion lest he should hurt the feelings
of some of his friends. We quote it at length, as it is
not only of singular interest in showing the kind of man
Volta was, but is also remarkably applicable to the
present day. This is what he wrote : —

" If some of my faults and negligences may have by
chance given occasion to someone to suspect me of
infidelity, I am ready, as some reparation for this and
for any other good purpose, to declare to such a one
and to every other person and on every occasion and
under all circumstances that I have always held, and hold
now, the Holy Catholic Religion as the only true and
infallible one, thanking without end the good God for
having gifted me with such a faith, in which I firmly
propose to live and die, in the lively hope of attaining
eternal life. I recognize my faith as a gift of God, a
supernatural faith. I have not, on this account, how-
ever, neglected to use all human means that could
confirm me more and more in it, and that might drive
away any doubt which could arise to tempt me in

71 I*

4 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

matters of faith. I have studied my faith with atten-
tion as to its foundations, reading for this purpose books
of apologetics as well as those written with a contrary
purpose, and trying to appreciate the arguments pro
and contra. I have tried to realize from what sources
spring the strongest arguments which render faith most
credible to natural reason, and such as cannot fail to
make every well-balanced mind which has not been
perverted by vice or passion embrace and love it. May
this protest of mine, which I have deliberately drawn
up and which I leave to posterity, subscribed with my
own hand, and which shows to all and everyone that I
do not blush at the Gospel — may it, as I have said,
produce some good fruit.

" Signed at Milan,

" January 6, 1815,

"ALESSANDRO VOLTA."

Volta, as we shall see, was a contemporary of Galvani,
and closely associated with him in some of the discoveries
which made their names memorable — a greater discoverer
according to some, and the man after whom the Unit of
Electro-Motive Force is named. In these days we con-
stantly read of a current of such and such a " voltage,"
or learn that along the wires which actuate our tram
service runs a current of so many " volts." It is not
likely that this terminology, which has now become
universal, will ever be disturbed, and as long as it lasts,
so long will the name of Alessandro Volta be con-
stantly brought before the minds of men. In another
part of this paper further facts concerning Volta will
be given in connection with his famous controversy with
Galvani.

A second Unit of which the general public hears less,
but which is in constant employment amongst electricians,
is the Ampere, which is the Unit of Current. It com-
memorates the name of Andre Marie Ampere (1775-

and some other Catholic Electricians 5

1836), Professor of Mathematics in the 6cole Poly-
technique, who, it may be pointed out, lived through
the troublous time of the French Revolution, yet carried
his firm Catholic faith to the end. It is related of him
that, after his conversations with Ozanam on the prob-
lems of science and philosophy, he was in the habit of
exclaiming, " How great is God, Ozanam 1 How great
is God and how little is our knowledge 1 " And the
same Ozanam's testimony to his religious fervour may
here be set down. " In addition to his scientific achieve-
ments, this brilliant genius has other claims upon our
admiration and affection. He was our brother in the
faith. It was religion which guided the labours of his
mind and illuminated his contemplations : he judged
all things, science itself, by the exalted standard of
religion. . . . This venerable head, which was crowned
by achievements and honours, bowed without reserve
before the mysteries of faith, down even below the line
which the Church has marked for us. He prayed before
the same altars before which Descartes and Pascal had
knelt ; beside the poor widow and the small child who
may have been less humble than he was. Nobody
observed the regulations of the Church more conscien-
tiously, regulations which are so hard on nature and
yet so sweet in the habit. Above all things, however,
it is beautiful to see what sublime things Christianity
wrought in his great soul : this admirable simplicity,
the unassumingness of a mind that recognized every-
thing except its own genius ; this high rectitude in
matters of science, now so rare, seeking nothing but the
truth and never rewards and distinctions ; the pleasant
and ungrudging amiability ; and lastly, the kindness
with which he met everyone, especially young people.
I can say that those who know only the intelligence of
the man, know only the less perfect part. If he thought
much, he loved more."

The third Unit, that of Quantity, is called the Coulomb,
73

6 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

and owes its name to Charles Augustin de Coulomb
(1736-1806), also a Catholic, of whom his biographer
Biot says : " Coulomb lived among the men of his time
in patience and charity. He was distinguished among
them mainly by his separation from their passions and
their errors, and he always maintained himself calm,
firm, and dignified in se totus, teres atque rotundus, as
Horace says, a complete, perfect, and well-rounded
character."

The fourth Unit is that of Resistance, and it is called
the Ohm. George Simon Ohm (1789-1854), after whom
it is named, was Professor at Nuremberg and subse-
quently, and until the time of his death, at Munich,
where he is buried. There is some doubt as to the
religion which he professed, though it is probable that
he was a Catholic. We will not, however, claim him
as such, and will content ourselves by pointing out that
his first teaching appointment of any importance was at
the Jesuit Gymnasium at Cologne, the principal place
of instruction for Catholic youth of the Rhineland ; and
that he held the position of Professor of Mathematics
in that institution for ten years. If not the rose, he
spent a long time very near the rose. But we incline
to the belief that he was a Catholic.

As to the person after whom the fifth Unit, that of
Capacity, is named, there is no doubt. The Farad is
called after Michael Faraday, who certainly was not
a Catholic, but a member of a small Christian sect. He
was, however, as his life testifies, a man fully convinced
of the truth of the Christian doctrines.

All the six persons whom we have named were ad-
herents of Christianity, and four of them, at least, were
Catholics, a fact which will take a good deal of explain-
ing away on the part of those who are never tired of
urging the irreconcilable claims of Religion and of
Science. It is now time to turn to the history of
Galvani, whose name is set at the head of this paper,

and some other Catholic Electricians 7

and of his celebrated controversy with Volta, an historical
episode in the tale of Experimental Science.

Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani, one of the greatest scientists
of the eighteenth century, was born in Bologna on the
I7th of September 1737. In early life he, like Johannes
Miiller, and indeed more than one other man who after-
wards became great in the roll of science, wished to
enter the Church, but later decided to embrace a medical
career. He obtained his medical degree in 1762. His
graduation thesis on the human skeleton, dealing mainly
with the formation and development of bone, gained
for its author the position of Lecturer in Anatomy in the
University of Bologna. Although not a fluent speaker,
he was most popular as a teacher, and one of the first
to illustrate his lectures by experiment. In 1775 he
was promoted to the Chair of Anatomy. Galvani did
much research work in comparative anatomy, and
amongst other things wrote a rather remarkable treatise
on the semi-circular canals of birds, in which, for the first
time, he gave exact measurements of these curious
structures, and pointed out the striking fact that in the
hawk these objects are of singular size, being absolutely
and not relatively larger than in any other bird, in man,
or even in the horse or the cow. He did not, however,
seize the significance of these canals, which we now
believe to be connected with direction and equilibration.
He wrote also a treatise on the kidneys of birds, which
attracted a good deal of attention in the scientific world
of the Europe of the day.

But it is with his discoveries in electrical science that
his fame is, and always will be, associated. At the time
at which he lived, the sciences of Anatomy and Physi-
ology, that is of Structure and Function, were not
separated from one another to the extent which they
now are. It is, indeed, only within our own day, so to
speak, that separate Chairs of Physiology from those

8 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

of Anatomy have been established in all Schools of
Medicine and other seats of learning. Galvani was
a Physiologist as well as an Anatomist, and in the
former capacity he made a special study of the nervous
system.

The susceptibility of the nerves to irritation was indeed
a subject to which he had devoted many years of study.
While engaged in this work one day in 1780 he tells us,
" I dissected and prepared1 a frog (see diagram and
description), and laid it on a table on which there stood
an electric machaine at a considerable distance from the
frog. As one of my assistants accidentally touched
with a scalpel the inner crural nerves of the frog, the
muscles of the limbs were violently convulsed. A
person who was accustomed to help us in our electrical
experiments thought he observed that at the same
moment a spark was drawn from the electric machine.
Marvelling at this new phenomenon he called my atten-
tion to it, though at the time I was deeply engaged in
other matters. I was suddenly inflamed with a great
desire to try the experiment myself, and to bring to
light what was hidden therein. I, too, touched the
crural nerve with the point of the scalpel, and got some-
one at the same time to draw a spark from the electric
machine. The same phenomenon as before occurred.
Every tune the muscles of the limbs were violently
convulsed as if the frog were seized with tetanus at the
instant the spark was drawn from the electric machine/'
Galvani's next experiment was to ascertain the effect
of lightning. For this purpose he employed a long
insulated iron wire reaching from his laboratory to
nearly the top of the house where the wire projected
into the open air. Its lower end was joined to the
crural nerves of a freshly prepared frog, its legs being

1 To prepare a frog, the animal is first killed, the hind legs are then
nen

%,
76

detached and skinned, the crural nerves and their attachments to the
lumbar vertebrae remaining. See fig., p. 10.

and some other Catholic Electricians §

attached to another iron wire which was connected to
the water in a well. Every time a lightning flash
occurred the muscles of the frog exhibited convulsions.
The insulated wire employed in this experiment was
not without danger. Riechmann was killed at St
Petersburg in 1753 by a discharge during a thunder-
storm from a similar apparatus, a fact which must have
been known to Galvani.

The susceptibility of the muscles of the frog to
atmospheric electricity in calm weather next engaged
Galvani's attention. His interest in the matter arose
from his having observed " that prepared frogs suspended
by brass hooks through the spinal marrow from an iron
lattice round a hanging garden of our house, exhibited
convulsions not only during thunderstorms but occasion-
ally also in fair weather." At first, Galvani attributed
these to variations in the electrical state of the atmo-
sphere, but they were probably caused by contact of
the iron lattice with the muscles of the leg. With a
view to testing the matter further he carefully watched,
during many days of calm weather, frogs suspended as
above from the iron lattice. Much to his disappoint-
ment, the convulsions he looked for rarely occurred.
At length, weary with waiting, he brought into a closed
room a frog with a brass hook through its spinal marrow,
and placing it on an iron plate he tells us, " when I
pressed the brass hook, fixed in the spinal marrow,
against the iron plate, behold ! the same contractions,
the same movements as before. I tried other metals
with the same result, except that the amount of con-
traction depended on the metals used." This is by far
the most important discovery made by Galvani, in
which he showed that when the nerves and muscles of
a frog are joined by a metallic arc, generally formed of
two metals, convulsions occur. These he ascribed to a
fluid the same as electricity, which flowed from the
nerves to the muscles through the connecting metallic

Aloisio (Luigt) Galvani

conductor. The accompanying diagram illustrates the
way in which the experiment is usually performed — (a)
and (b) denote two dissimilar metals, zinc and copper,
for example, soldered together, (c) the crural nerves,
(d) the muscles of the leg. At the instant the nerves
and muscles are connected, as in the figure, by the
metallic arc, contractions of the muscles occur, provided
the experiment be made shortly after the animal has

been killed ; a few hours after death the limbs lose this
contracting power.

The publication of Galvani's experiments excited great
interest in the scientific world, but his theory of animal
electricity did not meet with general acceptance. Con-
temporary opinion appears to have rather inclined
towards Volta, but Galvani's views are perhaps more
in harmony with modern theories.

Galvani regarded the muscle of the frog as the seat of
electrification, opposite electricities being stored in it,
as in a Leyden jar ; the nerves acting simply as con-

and some other Catholic Electricians 1 1

ductors. " That opposite electricities may be accumu-
lated in one and the same muscle anyone will admit
who has observed that the muscle fibres, although
apparently very simple, are really built up of different
solid and fluid parts which in no uncertain way point
to a difference of substance." Alessandro Volta, in a
letter written to Baronio in 1792, expresses the greatest
admiration for " the astonishing discoveries of Signor
Galvani." He began by accepting the theory of animal
electricity, which he was led ultimately to reject in the
course of repeating and varying Galvani's experiments.
He ascribed the contractions of the muscle to the stimu-
lating action on the nerves of electric currents, which he
held were due, not to electricity inherent in the animal,
but to the contact of the dissimilar metals which con-
stituted the connecting arc. " The electricity acts on
the nerves and on the nerves directly, however it may
be produced ; it is unnecessary to send the current from
the nerve to the muscle ; if it flow through a short length
of the nerve, contraction of the muscle follows : the
current is not the immediate cause of the contraction,
but the remote cause in so far as it stimulates the
nerve."

In support of his views, Volta describes the following
interesting experiment in a letter to Aldini, a nephew of
Galvani. " If, after the exposure of the crural nerves
of a frog or ischiaticus of a sheep or other animal, I
touch and press the nerve with the edge of a silver or
gold plate, a coin, for instance, I see that nothing happens
(sometimes a contraction occurs immediately after the
nerve has been exposed, as it is then very sensitive and
responds to the slightest touch) ; I then touch and press
it with the edge of a zinc plate ; and again I observe
no change ; finally, I touch it with the edges of both
plates : immediately violent contractions take place of
the muscle of the leg." At the time Volta made this
experiment he was unaware that twenty-five years

12 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

earlier a similar result had been obtained by Johann
Georg Sulzer, who noticed that if the tip of the tongue
be touched by two plates, one of lead, the other of silver,
and if at the same time the edges of the plates be brought
in contact, an acid taste " similar to that of vitriol of
iron/' is produced, although no such taste arises when
the tongue is touched by either of these metals alone.
Volta first heard of Sulzer's observation from Aldini,
and regarded it as confirmatory of his own views. " It
is clear," he writes, " that in all these experiments the
nerves only were excited by the electric current : it is
clear that the metals were the cause of the current :
they were the excitant and motive power of the elec-
tricity, the nerves being merely passive."

In the course of a long discussion between Galvani
and Volta, and their respective partizans, Galvani,
assisted by his nephew, Aldini, showed that contraction
might be obtained either (i) by using one metal only,
or (2) without the use of any metal. Cutting the nerves
from the vertebral canal and delicately raising them by
means of an insulating rod and placing them so as to
touch at a single point the muscle of the thigh of a frog,
contraction of the thigh immediately occurred. Galvani
also succeeded in producing contraction by connecting
the nerve to a muscular fragment of the belly, which
lay apart on a glass plate and without any conducting
connection with the frog. These experiments were held
by Galvani's followers completely to disprove Volta's
views. It is easy to see in his letters how much the
latter was wounded by the arrogant tone in which the
Galvinists, old and young, boasted of having reduced
him to silence. The silence, however, was not of long
duration. He pointed out that the success of these
experiments depended on the employment of organs of
the animal as different as possible, and on their being
connected by a third substance. He extended his
theory : holding that any two dissimilar substances,

and some other Catholic Electricians 13

whatever their nature, developed electricity by their
simple contact.

In the space at my disposal I cannot enter more fully
into this controversy. It was practically ended by the
following experiment due to Volta. He placed in
contact two plates, one of copper, the other of zinc,
which were held by insulating (glass, for instance) handles.
On rapidly separating the plates he showed, by means
of an electroscope, that both plates were charged with
electricity, the zinc positively, the copper negatively.
By repeatedly connecting and separating the plates and
communicating their charges to a condenser, he succeeded
in obtaining an electric spark. This discovery that
electricity is produced by the mere contact of dissimilar
metals is one of the greatest achievements of physical
science. Volta arranged the metals in a series such that
any of them, touched by a metal below it in the series,
became positively charged, and negatively if touched
by one above it. For instance, iron is positive with
respect to copper and negative with respect to zinc.
The electric condition of two metals in immediate con-
tact is the same as when one or more metals is placed
between them. It follows from this that a closed
metallic circuit, however many metals it embraces, does
not produce an electric current, at least, so long as all
the metal junctions are at the same temperature. If,
however, two plates, of copper and zinc, for instance,
be separated by a fluid, the difference of their electric
condition, or potential, as it is now called, is not the
same as when the two plates are in direct contact.

In 1800, a little more than a year after Galvani's
death, Volta invented his marvellous electric pile. In
a letter to Sir Joseph Banks he writes : " The apparatus,
which will no doubt astonish you, consists only in the
arrangement of a number of good conductors which
follow one another in a regular order. Thirty, forty, or
sixtv discs of copper, or better, silver, on each of which

14 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

a disc of tin, or better, zinc, is placed, and each pair
separated from the pair above it by a disc of moistened
pasteboard (so that the order is copper, zinc, pasteboard,
copper, zinc, pasteboard, and so on) ; such an orderly
arrangement of the three kinds of conductors is all my
apparatus consists of. It is capable of giving shocks
(when the ends are simultaneously touched with moistened

fingers), like that from a feebly charged Leyden jar of
enormous capacity. ... It is ever active without the
aid of electricity supplied by any hitherto known
means."

In the same letter Volta describes how, without altering
the order of the conductors, he changed the shape of his
apparatus into a form which is practically the same as
that of the modern electric battery. " One takes a

and some other Catholic Electricians 15

row or ring of glass cups, half filled with water, or better,
brine, and joined by the same number of metallic arcs ;
one arm of each arc is of copper, and dips into a cup,
whilst the other arm, which is of zinc and soldered to
the copper, dips into the next cup, and so on." When
arranged in ring form, the battery was known as the
couronne de tasses.

Volta attributed the action of his pile to the contact
of dissimilar metals. In this he was certainly wrong.
The intervening liquid conductor played a most im-
portant part : the electric current was maintained by
the chemical action of this liquid conductor on one of
the metals, on the zinc, in the zinc and copper pile.

First Cell. Last Cell.

P is extremity of circuit on the left. N is extremity of circuit on the right.

That chemical action was the cause of the currents
obtained by both Volta and Galvani was suggested by
Fabroni, a contemporary of theirs. He noticed that
when two dissimilar metals, suspended in water, were
made to touch, one of them became oxidized. The
correctness of this theory was subsequently established
by Sir Humphrey Davy, who showed that if the liquid
in a voltaic pile is pure water, no current is obtainable
from it, and that the activity of the pile " is in a great
measure proportional to the power of the conducting
fluid substance between the double plates to oxidate the
zinc." The striking effects furnished by the use of the
pile, such as the heating of conductors, the decomposi-
tion of chemical substances, and its physiological action,

1 6 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

excited great enthusiasm at the time. It brought fame
and honour to its inventor. Napoleon created Volta
a count and senator of Italy, granted him a liberal
pension, and in many other ways bestowed signal
favours on him.

In 1819 Volta retired to Como from his position in
the University of Turin. From this onwards his relations
with the scientific world ceased. In his retirement we
are told he almost avoided the many travellers, who,
attracted by his great fame, came to pay him homage.
He spent a great part of his remaining years in the
practice of his religion. He died in 1827 at the age of
eighty-two. All Italy mourned his loss. Como cele-
brated his obsequies with great pomp. The professors
and pupils of the high school, and all the leading in-
habitants of the city and surrounding country joined in
the funeral procession. A beautiful monument was
raised to his memory in the picturesque village of
Cammergo, from which his family originally came.

I can only briefly refer to Volta's earlier contributions
to physical science. He invented the electrophorus and
condensing electroscope. He devised a form of absolute
electrometer. He studied the electrification of bodies
in great detail, and under a great variety of conditions
and form. He showed that the charge on a conductor
is dependent on its shape ; for instance, in the case of
two cylinders of equal surface, the longer one receives
the larger charge. He obtained correct values for the
dilatation of air with increasing temperature, and was
the first to point out the necessity of enclosing the air
in a perfectly dry flask. He discovered the action of
flames in discharging electricity, and applied it to the
study of atmospheric electricity. Chemists, too, are in
debted to Volta for the invention of the eudiometer, and
the discovery of the origin of marsh gas.

Returning now to the history of Galvani, it is sad to
think that, unlike those of Volta, his closing years were

and some other Catholic Electricians 17

clouded by misfortune. Added to domestic bereavement
and physical infirmity was a waning public interest in
his great work, partly owing to the striking discoveries
of his opponent, Volta. A man of great piety and conser-
vative principles, he abhorred the changes wrought by the
French Revolution, and when the Cisalpine Republic
was established by French influence, he refused to take
the oath of allegiance, and in consequence was deprived
of his professorial chair. The next two years were
spent in penury. At length, in 1798, the Republican
Government decided to reinstate him, though he still
refused to take the oath of allegiance. But it was too
late. The great man died broken-hearted in December
of the same year. Honours were showered on him after
his death. In 1804 a medal was struck in his honour,
and in 1814 a monument was erected to him in the
University of Bologna. With regard to Galvani's reli-
gious views, it is perhaps hardly necessary to do more
than to point out that, because his conscience forbade him,
he refused to take the oath of allegiance to the so-called
Cisalpine Republic in July. On this account he not
only, as we have said, lost his professorship, or the
stipend on which he had largely to rely for his living, but
was brought to actual want during the two years he thus
remained excluded from his chair. Of these circum-
stances his biographer, Professor Venturoli, says : " The
great founder in electricity was deeply religious, and his
piety clothed a heart that was not less affectionate and
sensitive than it was intrepid and courageous. When
called upon to take the civic oath in a formula involved in
ambiguous words, he did not believe that he ought, on so
serious an occasion, to permit himself anything but the
clear and precise expression of his sentiments, full as they
were of honesty and rectitude. Refusing to take advan-
tage of the suggestion that he should modify the oath by
some declaration apart from the prescribed formula,
though it might still be generally understood that he had

85 "

1 8 Aloisio (Luigi) Galvani

taken the oath, he refused constantly to commit himself
to any such subterfuge. It is not our duty here to ask
whether his conclusion was correct or not. He followed the
voice of his conscience, which ever must be the standard of
duty, and it certainly would have been a fault to have
deviated from it. It is sad to think that this great man,
deprived of his position, saw himself, for an instant at
least, exposed to the danger of ending his career, deprived
of the recompense which he so richly deserved, and to
which his past services to the State and the University
had given him so just a title. This is all the more sad
when we realize that the vicissitudes of his delicate
health, much more than his age, now rendered such
recompense doubly necessary. It is a gracious thing to
recall, however, the noble firmness with which he main-
tained himself against so serious a blow. His courage
is all the more admirable as one can see how absolutely
without affectation it was. He was not ostentatious in his
goodness, and did not permit himself to be cast down by
the unfortunate conditions, but constantly preserved in
the midst of adverse fortune that modest, imperturbable
and dignified conduct which had always characterized
him in the midst of his prosperity and his glory."

Alibert, another biographer, writing of him in 1801,
shortly after his death, says : " We have seen already
what was Galvani's zeal and his love for the religion
which he professed. We may add that, in his public
demonstrations, he never finished his lectures without
exhorting his pupils to a renewal of their faith, by leading
them always back to the idea of the eternal Providence
which develops, preserves, and causes life to flow among
so many different kinds of things."

But the most significant fact perhaps is one given in
Professor Walsh's account of his life : " Before he died,
he asked, as had his favourite poet Dante, whose Divina
Commedia had been one of the pleasures of his life, and
above all one of the consolations of his times of adversity,

and some other Catholic Electricians 19

to be buried in the humble habit of a member of the
Third Order of St Francis. He is said to have valued
his fellowship with the sons of the ' Little Poor Man of
Assisi' more than the many honorary fellowships of
various kinds which had been conferred upon him by
scientific societies all over Europe."

RENE THEODORE HYACINTHE LAENNEC

RENfi THEODORE LAENNEC

(1781-1826)

B. J. COLLINGWOOD, B.A., M.D., B.CH.

Professor of Physiology ', University College , Dublin.

I. SCIENCE AND FAITH

Is there not a necessary antagonism between the un-
compromising dogmas of the Church and the enquiring
mind of the student of nature ? Can a Catholic be a
man of science ? Is not scepticism the normal attitude
of those engaged in research ?

Such questions are frequently asked. It is one of the
objects of the Catholic Truth Society in publishing this
series of lives of Catholic men of science to give an
answer.

It cannot be denied that many men in the first rank of
science have been Catholics, and have remained Catholics
to the end. But something more than this is required
to answer fuUy the questions asked. It may be and is
argued that an antagonism may really exist between
Faith and Science, although the two exist together in one
mind. It is unfortunately easy to divide the mind into
two compartments, one of which is labelled Religion,
and the other Science. The thoughts which occupy these
compartments are not allowed to wander : there is no
door between them. In short, contradictory statements
can be and are believed by the same man. If a man
hopes to be consistent he must not only have thoughts,
but he must think about his thoughts. It is the latter
duty that many men avoid. Thought No. i must not
5 89 i

2 Rend Theodore Laennec

be introduced to thought No. 2, for fear that they might
quarrel; they must be kept separate and caged. Yet
the mind is not a menagerie.

Perhaps, then, it is urged, the Catholic man of science
puts Catholicism on one side of his mind and Science on
the other, keeping both happy by keeping them apart ;
possibly he is broad-minded, in the sense that his mind
is stretched laterally to afford space for incompatible
ideas. Such criticism if unanswerable would, in the
writer's opinion, rob this series of booklets of any
argumentative value. If an individual agrees to differ
from himself, one must be excused if one differs from
him.

The facts of science are stubborn things, one cannot
get round them, one cannot get past them, and if one
attempts to get through them, one is damaged. The
dogmas of the Church are equally stubborn; they are
more immovable than the hills, for Faith can move the
hills whilst it holds the dogmas firm. If it is here that
an antagonism exists, the case is hopeless; we must
either close our churches or our laboratories, or, better
still, both.

But science does not consist solely of facts, it does not
even consist mainly of facts. There is a large amount
of theory mixed with a small amount of fact. It is with
the theories of science and not with the facts that the
dogmas of the Church may come in conflict. If, as the
Catholic believes, dogmas are facts, it is only to be
expected that they, like facts, should frequently be in
conflict with theories. And this is a matter of no import-
ance, for theories are not permanent, they are constantly
changing, constantly disappearing. Nature says, I will
give you ten thousand guesses at the truth : Man makes
one ; thus is a theory born. Just as we are all warned
not to put our trust in princes, so the student of science
is warned not to put his trust in theories. Yet theories
have a function to perform, and that is to suggest fresh

Rent Theodore Laennec 3

experiments, these latter frequently dealing the death-
blow to the theory that gave them birth. When theories
claim absolute truth they cease to be fertile ; they become
the enemies not the friends of science. The theories of
science are excellent parents of facts, but they are often
short-lived.

What, then, is the attitude of the Catholic man of
science ? He has found and he will always find that there
is no antagonism between the facts of science and the
dogmas of the Church. He has found and he will always
find that there are certain theories which are antagonistic
to the dogmas of the Church. He has found and he will
always find that where there is real antagonism it is the
theory not the dogma that dies. He has not found and
he will never find that his knowledge and his faith are
incompatible.

Is his freedom of research restricted ? Yes, if he be
in search of theories. No, if he be in search of facts.
Facts have no terrors for him ; he is not afraid of fresh
discoveries, for he has faith in the Creator of all pheno-
mena. He does not ask himself, as many a sceptic does,
what is the purpose of gaining fresh knowledge, for where
does it lead ? for he believes that each step gained in
knowledge is a step towards perfection. Because he
hears the voice of God in the Church, he is eager to catch
every whisper of that voice in the world of nature. He
knows that God is walking in the garden. He is not
afraid.

A complex mechanism is presented to us for examina-
tion. Someone tell us that it is a mere fortuitous
mixture of wheels and springs, purposeless and futile.
It comes from nowhere, it is going nowhere, probably it
is not going at all. Waste no time on it, there are better
things to do. Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.
Another tell us that the mechanism is the work of a
supreme artist, more than worthy of the study of a life-
time. Let us work and think, for to-morrow we live.

4 Rent Theodore Laennec

Faith, faith in something, is the essential stimulus to
research. Work without faith is as impossible as faith
without work. A man who believes nothing will never
want to know anything. Thus the most foolish creed is
better than no creed at all. It is wiser to believe that
God is made of stone than to believe that stone made
itself, since the first entails the belief that there is some-
thing in stone well worth investigating.

Is there an answer to the riddle of nature ? The
agnostic hesitates to reply. The Catholic says Yes, and
by that very affirmative he is encouraged to proceed to
discover that answer. His Catholicism is not an impedi-
ment but a spur. It does not say to him, Thus far shalt
thou go but no farther ; on the contrary, it tells him to
push forward with all the power he possesses. The
riddle can be solved, and he does not fear the solution.
Finis coronat opus.

II. RENE THEODORE LAENNEC

The present pages are concerned with a Catholic man
of science to whom medicine owes an overwhelming debt
for his discoveries of methods for the diagnosis of
disease. Rene Theodore Laennec was born on I7th
February 1781, at Quimper, in Brittany. His father
was a lawyer whose acumen turned him more towards
literature than law. His mother died when Laennec
was six years old; and his early education was con-
ducted by the Abbe Laennec, his grand-uncle, at Elliant,
under whose tutelage four or five years were passed.
He was then sent to continue his education with his
uncle, Dr Laennec, at Nantes.^ Here he gained many
prizes, and in addition to his normal studies he interested
himself in the medical work of his uncle. It was observa-
tion on his own account rather than reading about the
observations of others that attracted him. Here lies
the distinction between the first-rate and the second-rate

Rend Theodore Laennec 5

mind. The clinical study of cases in the Military
Hospital excited his keen attention. Although signs of
brilliancy showed themselves in him, it is a fact that the
early life of genius and the early life of mediocrity have
frequently much in common — buds are much more alike
than flowers. Even in later life some find a difficulty in
distinguishing a fool from a genius ; in early life it is well-
nigh impossible.

In the year 1800, when he was nineteen years old, he
proceeded to Paris, where he was to make his name
resound throughout the world of medicine. Before
scarcely a year had passed he was awarded the two first
prizes in medicine and surgery by the University of Paris.
In 1804 he wrote two theses on Hippocrates, the father of
medicine in Greece.

The Paris school of medicine at that time exhibited its
vitality by possessing two eminent men of strongly
opposed views, Pinel and Corvisart. Pinel was a teacher
of philosophic medicine, attempting to find the origin of
disease by an analysis of the conditions of disease, best
known to-day as the physician who freed the insane from
the manacles that hitherto had been regarded as necessary
restraints. The insane owe him much. Corvisart, who
insisted on the absolute need of bedside investigation,
was an exponent of the tradition of Hippocrates. Cor-
visart the physician because he was a clinician ; Pinel
the clinician because he was a physician.

Laennec was naturally drawn to Corvisart and became
one of his favourite pupils, and Corvisart was an excellent
master, for he possessed the rare power of stimulating
others to investigate ; he was a great teacher in that he
induced others to teach themselves. Under him Laennec
could freely indulge his enthusiasm for the study of the
signs of disease in the living and the dead. Thus ten
years passed.

In 1812 he became physician to the Beaujon Hospital
in Paris. In 1816 he was appointed to the famous

6 Rent Theodore Laennec

Necker Hospital, and it was there his genius proclaimed
itself. From all parts of the world students came to
hear his lectures, for these lectures were stored with new
thought, new wisdom, and new discoveries. A con-
temporary writes of him thus : " Laennec was almost
an ideal teacher. He talked very easily, and his lesson
was always arranged with logical method, clearness, and
simplicity. He disdained utterly all the artifices of
oratory. He knew, however, how to give his lectures a
charm of their own. It was as if he were holding a
conversation with those who heard him, and they were
interested every moment of the time he talked, so full
were his lectures of practical instruction."

Many a teacher fails apparently to interest even
himself ; Laennec's achievement of interesting others at
every moment is therefore remarkable.

III. THE DISCOVERY OF THE STETHOSCOPE

It is, however, in the method of auscultation that
Laennec found his claim to fame. It should be explained
that auscultation consists in listening to the sounds pro-
duced by the lungs and heart in health and disease.
For the lungs and the heart, which are machines in con-
stant action, have their language like all other machines.
They talk in one way when all is well, and in another way,
indeed in various other ways, when something is going
wrong with the mechanism. Is it not in one of Charles
Reade's novels that a character is introduced whose one
use in life was to tell by the sound of the running grind-
stones whether they were safe or whether they were
entering upon a state in which they would be a source of
grave danger to all those working with them ? At any
rate, everyone who is in the habit of driving a motor-car
or riding a bicycle is aware that he must use his ears at
least as much as any other of his senses if he wants to
proceed safely and comfortably on his journeyings. Such

Rend Theodore Laennec 7

persons rapidly learn to detect the differences between
the normal sounds when the machine is running satis-
factorily and the abnormal unaccustomed sounds which
may arise from some trivial cause or may portend
something seriously wrong with the mechanism. And
so the driver or rider will stop his machine and get down
to ascertain whether the disagreeable and unaccustomed
sounds which have been annoying his ears are due to a
nut which wants tightening if accident is to be avoided, or
merely to a loose strap and buckle which may clack and
clack and do no harm. In the same way the lungs have
their own characteristic language in health and in disease.
The gentle whisper of normal respiration may pass into
the painful bubbling breathing of serious disease, a
change audible and obvious even to the untrained
observer. And between these extremes there are a
thousand and one variations not similarly obvious to the
non-medical man, but all conveying important informa-
tion to the trained ear. Similarly with the heart, that
untiring muscle which day and night pumps blood
through the arteries, capillaries, and veins, it also has
its normal language and its cry of distress. To some
extent these sounds can be investigated by the
method of placing the ear directly on the chest-wall
and listening to what is going on inside. Such a plan,
however, presents a variety of disadvantages, some of
which will be alluded to further on, and is at anyrate
open to this grave objection, that the sounds can neither
be as clearly distinguished nor as sharply located by the
method of immediate auscultation as they can be by that
of mediate.

In other words, to use plain language, the doctor can
make out what is wrong better by listening through some
form of stethoscope than he can by placing his ear
directly on the patient's chest. Laennec's great reputa-
tion depends on the fact that he discovered a method
of hearing these sounds clearly and that he interpreted

8 Rend Theodore Laennec

them correctly. Laennec, in short, was the inventor of
the stethoscope, that instrument which most of us have
felt upon our chests whilst wondering vaguely what the
doctor heard, if, indeed, he heard anything.

Laennec's stethoscope was tubular and of wood — in
fact, a reproduction in wood of the quire of paper the story
of which is shortly to be told ; and on this model for many
years stethoscopes were constructed. Many people will
remember having seen such instruments stuck in the
interior of the professional silk-hat of the medical adviser,
that being a favourite place to carry the implement.
Nowadays a binaural instrument, consisting of rubber or
metal tubes or both, with earpieces for both ears of the
doctor and a chest-piece to rest on the patient, is more
usual, but, whichever form we come in contact with, the
principle is the same. It is the principle of the conduc-
tion of sounds from the chest of the patient to the ears
of the physician by means of an intermediate channel.
That is the stethoscope, and it remains and must ever
remain one of the most valuable implements of physical
diagnosis in the armamentarium of the medical man.
We may place it beside the clinical thermometer, also the
discovery of a French physician, as one of the two most
commonly used instruments for diagnostic purposes.

As to the discovery of the stethoscope, Laennec must
be allowed to speak for himself. " In 1816," he
writes, " I was consulted by a young person who was
labouring under the general symptoms of diseased
heart. In her case percussion and the application of
the hand (what modern doctors call palpation) were
of little service because of a considerable degree of
stoutness; the other method, that namely of listening
to the sounds within the chest by the direct applica-
tion of the ear to the chest wall, being rendered in-
admissible by the age and sex of the patient." Some
will remember the irritation caused by the direct
method in the case of a whiskered physician.

Rend Theodore Laennec 9

Laennec continues : "I happened to recollect a simple
and well-known fact in acoustics, and fancied it might
be turned to some use on the present occasion. The fact
I allude to is the great distinctness with which we hear
the scratch of a pin at one end of a piece of wood on
applying our ear to the other.

" Immediately on the occurrence of this idea I rolled
a quire of paper into a kind of cylinder, and applied one
end of it to the region of the patient's heart and the other
to my ear. I was not a little surprised and pleased to
find that I could thereby perceive the action of the heart
in a manner much more clear and distinct than I had ever
been able to do by the immediate application of the ear.

" From this moment I imagined that the circumstance
might furnish means of enabling us to ascertain the
character, not only of the action of the heart, but of
every species of sound produced by the motion of all
the thoracic viscera, and consequently for the exploration
of the respiration, the voice, the rales, and perhaps even
the fluctuation of fluid effused in pleura or pericardium.
With this conviction I forthwith began, at the Necker
Hospital, a series of observations from which I have
been able to deduce a set of new signs of the diseases of
the chest. These are for the most part certain, simple,
and prominent, and calculated, perhaps, to render the
diagnosis of the diseases of the lungs, heart, and pleura
as decided and circumstantial as the indications furnished
to the surgeons by the finger or sound in the complaints
wherein these are of use."

The claim which Laennec here makes for the value
of his discovery is under-estimated. There are few
men who, when they have discovered one thing, do not
think they have discovered all things. Laennec was one
of these few; he possessed a mind which could value
correctly the consequences of his own work. He occupied
two years in studying not only the possibilities but also
the limitations of the stethoscope ; after this investiga-

io Rend Theodore Laennec

tion he sent an account of his work to the French Academy
of Sciences. Three members of the Academy were
selected to investigate his discovery, Doctors Pellet an,
Portal, and Percy, These must have been somewhat
remarkable men, for they adopted the unusual course
of reporting favourably on the new discovery. Even so,
they showed the conservatism which is by no means
absent in medicine by an extreme caution in their
approval. The faintness of their praise leaves them but
a faint reflection of Laennec's fame.

Before Laennec's time, the diseases of the lungs and
heart in man were in much the same nebulous condition
as diseases of cattle were till recently. A disease of the
lungs, accompanied by fever, was " lung fever," and there
was an end of it. A disease of the heart was clearly
" heart disease," and what more could be said ? But
Laennec changed all this. He showed that disease of
the lungs took many forms, and that these forms could
be distinguished from each other. Again, it is to Laen-
nec's introduction of auscultation by the stethoscope
that medicine owes its knowledge of heart diseases and
their diagnosis. The Irish school of medicine applied
his method with brilliant results in the cardiac lesions
which he himself had failed to interpret.

Laennec's method of auscultation rapidly drew
students from even the most distant parts. The simpli-
city of the discovery was in itself an attraction ; added
to this there was self-evident utility in calling in the
sense of hearing as an aid to diagnosis.

" A sense was lacking in medicine," wrote Builland,
" and I would say, if I dared, that Laennec, the creator,
by a sort of divine delegation, of a new sense, supplied
the long-felt want. The sense which medicine lacked
was hearing. Sight and touch had already been developed
in the service of medical diagnosis. Hearing was more
important than the other two senses, and in giving it to
scientific medicine Laennec disclosed a new world of

Rend Theodore Laennec 1 1

knowledge, destined to complete the rising science of
diagnosis." " Laennec in placing his ear on the chest,"
said Henri Roger, " heard for the first time in the his-
tory of disease the cry of suffering organs. . . . His ear
opened to the mind a new world in medical science."

It is interesting to record that Laennec made his
own stethoscopes, sometimes constructed them ornately.
One probably made by him is treasured in the museum
of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia.

Three years of investigation of auscultation of the lungs
and heart preceded Laennec's great book on the subject,
a book which has become a classic. Dr Austin Flint,
the elder, one of the greatest diagnosticians of America,
writes of it thus : " Suffice it to say here that, although
during the forty years that have elapsed since the
publication of Laennec's works the application of physical
exploration has been considerably extended and rendered
more complete in many of its details, the fundamental
truths presented by the discoverer of auscultation not
only remain as a basis of the new science, but for a large
portion of the existing superstructure. Let the student
become familiar with all that is now known on the subject,
and he will then read the writings of Laennec with
amazement that there remained so little to be altered or
added."

One of the sure signs of genius is its finality, and the
work of Laennec exhibited this sign to a marked degree.

It was not only in the diagnosis of thoracic diseases
that Laennec left his mark. His work was over a most
extensive field. Every subj ect he touched he illuminated.
For instance, he investigated the influence of alcoholic
excess on the liver, and it is to him we owe much of our
knowledge of " cirrhosis of the liver," a term he himself
originated.

In this connection non-professional readers may be
reminded of the dire effects upon the liver of constant

12 Rent Theodore Laennec

alcoholic excess, and particularly of continuous and
excessive drinking of spirits such as gin, whisky, brandy,
and the like. Under normal circumstances the liver
presents a smooth, shining surface, even and unbroken
by elevations. When affected by cirrhosis this appear-
ance is entirely altered, and the organ, instead of being
smooth, becomes studded with little knobs or elevations
something like the studded or " non-slip " tyres with
which we are all familiar on motor-cars. This changed
condition is sometimes known as " hob-nail liver " or
" gin-drinker's liver," and more scientifically as " cir-
rhosed liver." What has happened is this : The liver
normally consists of a very large amount of glandular
tissue, with, of course, the necessary blood-vessels, ducts,
and nerves. With this is associated a small amount of
fibrous tissue, but this last element exists, relatively, in
very small proportions when compared with the great
bulk of the organ, which consists of glandular cells.
Under the influence of alcohol, and especially, as above
mentioned, of alcohol in the form of what are commonly
called " spirits," the fibrous tissue takes on an active
growth. It not only does this, but, as it increases in
quantity in proportion to the glandular tissue, it con-
tracts and causes islands of glandular tissue to project
between the meshes of the network which it forms.
These islands are the elevations or " hob-nails," and the
depressed portions between are formed of fibrous tissue.
It is perhaps hardly necessary to point out that such
grave changes in the structure and size of the liver — for
as a whole it becomes shrunken and contracted — cannot
take place without equally grave effects on the general
health of the victim of this disease. With these effects
we are not concerned here, for this is neither a treatise
on hepatic pathology nor a temperance tract. Suffice it
to say that the points just alluded to were in large
measure elucidated by Laennec, and that for this
addition to medical knowledge alone his name would

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Rent Theodore Laennec 13

have deserved an honourable place in the history of
medicine. As it is, the greatness of the discovery of the
stethoscope has overshadowed his other claims on our
gratitude ; but in any account of his life, however brief,
some mention of his services to medicine in the direction
now indicated must not be omitted.

After some twenty years of devotion to medical
science Laennec's health gave way, and he retired to the
country for two years to recuperate. Although being
fully assured that a return to work would entail a second
illness, he nevertheless returned to Paris at the end of
this time, and again took up his hospital duties, A
year later he was appointed Professor of Medicine in
the College of France, and subsequently to the chair of
clinical medicine at his old hospital, La Charite.

IV. His PERSONAL CHARACTER

Something should be said as to the personal character
of the man, for we are concerned not only with Laennec
as a leader of medical thought, but with Laennec as a,
Christian, and there can be no doubt that throughout
his life he was an example to others of what a Christian
gentleman should be. His intimates have declared that
they never found him in an angry mood or even in an
impatient one ; he was always calm. In his discussions
with others this calm never failed him, whatever pro-
vocation his opponents gave him.

He was a true friend, always ready to give assistance,
and, what is more remarkable, he injured no one. An
intimate friend of his has placed on record that he had
never heard Laennec express by a single word, or even
by the slightest insinuation, anything that might seem to-
indicate pride in what he had accomplished, or that
might provoke a listener to say anything in his praise.

One of his biographers, Dr Henri Saintignon, writes
of him thus : "I have shown in the course of this life

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14 Rent Theodore Laennec

just what was the character of Laennec and his intellectual
and moral qualities, so that it will not be necessary for
me to dwell at length on this subject in concluding.
His great piety, which had never been abandoned from
his earliest infancy, was his main guide during all his life.
Without ostentation, yet without any weakness, absolutely
ignoring human respect, he obeyed with utter simplicity
the prescriptions of his faith. While he did not conceal
his convictions when during the First Empire they might
have proved a source of lessened esteem, or positive
prejudice, he made no noise about them when under
the Restoration they might have proved the means of
advancement and of fortune. He had not in the slightest
degree what is so often objected to in devoted persons,
namely, the love of making proselytes. The words of
Professor Desgenettes might very well have been applied
to him : as he did not believe himself to have any mission
to lead others to his opinions, he limited himself to
preaching by example. The reproach of being rabidly
clerical or propagandist, which was urged against him
when he first became a member of the faculty of medicine,
was absolutely unjustified. Laennec never occupied
himself with politics nor with religion in public. As
a physician he devoted himself exclusively to his pro-
fession, receiving at his clinic all those who desired to
follow his teaching, whatever might be their opinions
or their beliefs."

We gain some knowledge of the man when we are told
that he often refused to see rich patients from lack of
time, but he was never known to refuse to see a poor
patient. A genius is rare, but a genius who shines not
only with the light of knowledge but also with the light
of charity is far more rare. Laennec, indeed, was a true
son of the Church, and a glory to the land that gave him
birth.

" His religious principles, imbibed with his earliest
knowledge, were strengthened by the conviction of his

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Rend Theodore Laennec 15

maturer reason." Thus wrote his contemporary, Bayle,
concerning him. " His life," said another, " affords a
striking instance among others disproving the vulgar
error that the pursuit of science is unfavourable to
religious faith." As an instance of his piety, we are
told that once on his way to Paris, in company with his
wife, they were thrown from their carriage. On re-
suming their seats, Laennec said, " We were at the third
decade " ; and they resumed their rosary at the place
where they had been interrupted by the accident.

The sceptic may well find Laennec an insoluble prob-
lem ; to him a mature faith only implies an immature
mind, yet Laennec's mind was of the first order. To the
sceptic the teaching of the Church is but a skilful blend
of poetry and superstition, yet Laennec accepted this
teaching, and he possessed an intellect far keener than
the vast majority of unbelievers. The sceptic finds in
Laennec an addition to the vast number of riddles which
he cannot solve. He cannot doubt Laennec's genius,
and he cannot doubt Laennec's faith, and, as he thinks,
the two are mutually destructive. The sceptic finds
more mysteries than the Christian, but the mysteries
of the unbeliever depend on his eyes being closed, whilst
those of the Christian depend on his eyes being open.

The world is not surprised to find a sane mind in a sane
body, and the Catholic is not surprised to find a sane
mind in a sane soul ; he is, indeed, surprised to find the
contrary. It may be difficult to understand the origin
of Laennec's genius, but it is not difficult to understand
how genius and faith existed together within him.

V. His LAST DAYS

Before long, after his return to Paris, Laennec's health
again began to fail. Overwork and a constant association
with tubercular patients were the probable cause of this
misfortune, for he himself became a victim of tubercle

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1 6 Rend Theodore Laennec

of the lung. His condition rapidly grew worse, and a
release from work became imperative. He returned to
his native Brittany, where he developed all the signs
of phthisis. Various remedies were tried, but without
success, the treatment of tuberculosis in those days being
in a very primitive condition. It could be said of him,
as it was said of his Master : " He saved others, but him-
self he could not save." His charity to the poor, always
a feature of his character, became very marked ; and his
great anxiety was to avoid giving trouble to others.

The cure of Kerlouanec paid him frequent visits and
administered to him the consolations of religion. All
knew that the end was very near. Shortly before his
death he removed the rings from his hand, saying to his
wife, " It will not be long before someone else would
have to do this service for me, and I do not wish that
they should have the trouble." Two hours later, on
August 13, 1826, Laennec breathed his last. Thus
passed from earth a pioneer of medicine and a true
Catholic.

A man who spent his life and strength in alleviating
the suffering of others ; a man whose lucid mind was eager
and able to solve the mysteries of nature ; a man whose
clear soul reflected the mysteries of God : such a man
rests in Laennec's grave.

[The writer wishes to express his indebtedness to
the essay on Laennec by Dr J. Walsh in Makers of
Modern Medicine, published by the Fordham University
Press, New York.]

104

JOHANNES MULLER

(1801-1858)

BY G. A. BOULENGER, D.Sc., PH.D., F.R.S., &c.

IN the illustrious man whose life and work we shall
endeavour briefly to sketch, we have an example, rare
in the history of Science, of one who rose to fame at
the very outset of his career, and, after holding for
a quarter of a century the highest position to which
a man of science can attain, disappeared suddenly
from the scene of his triumphs at the very moment
when doctrines in so many respects opposed to his
were to revolutionize biology, and, for a time, to carry
everything before them.

Unlike Gregor Mendel, who died nearly thirty years
ago, venerated in his monastery but almost unknown
to the scientific world, and whose name and work now
fill more columns in the Encyclopaedia Britannica than
are devoted to any of his contemporaries in science, he
reaped in his lifetime all the recognition and honours
which a well-earned reputation can ensure.

He has been called the Cuvier of Germany, but it is
difficult to say in which of the two great branches of
knowledge he cultivated, Zoology and Physiology, he
has shone the brighter.

Johannes Miiller was born on July 14, 1801, at

Coblentz, then under French rule — the inverse of the

great Cuvier, who was born and received his first

education on French territory, then occupied by the

6 105 I

2 Johannes Mutter

Germans. His father was a rather well-to-do shoe-
maker, whose ambition for his eldest son went no
further than to destine him for the leather trade. But
after some years' schooling in the so-called Jesuit Col-
lege at Coblentz (1810-1815) — replaced, after the expul-
(1816-1818) — the boy showed such exceptional aptitude
for study that, through his enlightened mother's influ-
ence, the father's intention was abandoned, and young
Miiller, after serving a year in the army as a volunteer,
was sent to the newly founded University at Bonn.
Whilst there, at the age of eighteen, he evinced a strong
bent towards natural science, which gradually took
hold of him to such an extent as to make him abandon
his intention of devoting himself to the service of the
Church — a thought which had been present to his mind
since early childhood, and which had been encouraged
by his pious and affectionate mother. Even then,
however, he wavered, and it is said he shut himself up
in his room for several days to arrive at a decision,
with the result that he chose Medicine, and two years
later was the recipient of the first prize awarded by
the Medical Faculty of the University, a singular
honour for a lad of twenty.

His first publication, in Oken's Isis for 1822, on
locomotion in insects, spiders, and centipedes — which,
in enlarged form, constituted his thesis for the degree of
M.D. (Dec. 14, 1822) — was so permeated with the ideas
of the new school of Natural Philosophy, then in
fashion through the influence of Goethe and Oken, and
later, in this country, of Owen, that, on freeing him-
self after a time from its doctrines, he so regretted
this work as to make all possible efforts to buy up
any copies in the market for the purpose of burning
them. It is somewhat remarkable that he should have
chosen as his first subject of investigation a group of
creatures for which he felt an innate repulsion. As a

106

Johannes Muller 3

boy he was known for his dread of spiders, a dread which
his schoolfellows lost no opportunity of arousing in order
to tease him. Yet a few years later, when a soldier on
watch duty on the old walls of Coblentz, he whiled
away the time by observing the movements of spiders,
and even went so far as to keep some in boxes for
weeks, with the object of better understanding the
principles of their locomotion, slower in individuals
weakened by a long starvation.

Muller was in the second year of his university
studies when he lost his father, and as the shoe-making
business became a failure, he found himself in such
reduced circumstances as threatened to interfere with
his career ; but living with the strictest economy, he
managed to get along, helped by friends, among whom
was Rehfues, one of the most influential men of the
University, who even obtained money for him from the
Catholic Theological Faculty. He was thus enabled to
undertake a journey to Berlin, in 1823, where, on the
recommendation of Rehfues, he enlisted the support of
the Minister of Education, von Altenstein, a support
which was continued to him ever after and was to lead
to his appointment as a professor in the Berlin Univer-
sity. Great was the young man's joy at finding himself
in the Prussian capital among the treasures of the
anatomical collections over which Rudolphi presided,
and of the Zoological Museum under Lichtenstein, as
well as at the genial reception which Rudolphi extended
to him. There he laid the foundation for his work on
the comparative physiology of vision, and prepared his
first contribution to morphology, dealing with some
points in the anatomy of an orthopterous insect,
Phasma.

In 1824 he was appointed Privatdocent in Bonn
University, to lecture on anatomy and physiology. The
work on vision in man and animals, which, as we have
said, was begun in Berlin, came out in 1826, as a

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4 Johannes Muller

separate book of 426 pages, published in Leipzig, full of
well-observed and important facts and judicious reason-
ing, marshalled in masterly fashion. This great work
was soon followed by a smaller essay on the phantasmal
phenomena of vision, on which subject he had much
experimented upon himself, to the detriment of his
health.

The success of his teaching was such that, at the age
of twenty-five, he was raised to the rank of Professor in
Extraordinary, without, however, receiving the emolu-
ments attaching to the post. He tried to increase his
income by practising as a doctor, but without much
success. Poor as he was, he nevertheless married in
1827; and trying to meet this increase in responsibility
by excessive work, he nearly came to grief. A serious
nervous illness seized him; he fancied himself nearing
paralysis and death; and gave up all his occupations.
Fortunately, his friends came to the rescue ; he ob-
tained from the Minister of Education a long leave of
absence and a grant of money with which he hired a
horse and trap, and, in company with his devoted wife,
started on a tour on the Rhine and in South Germany,
from which he returned some months later fully restored
to health.

Having thus regained his extraordinary working
powers, Muller investigated the structure of the eye in
Invertebrates, the nervous system of animals in general,
and of scorpions, spiders, and centipedes in particular
the embryos of man and mammals, the genital organs
of animals, discovered the pronephros (primitive kid-
ney) in Batrachians, the minute primordial filament,
since known as the Miillerian duct, which gives rise to
the oviduct or Fallopian tube, and, in 1830, brought out
his celebrated work De Glandularum, &c. This work
at once placed him among the foremost anatomists,
and was rewarded by the Paris Academy of Sciences
with a gold medal. The intimate structure of the

1 08

Johannes Milller 5

secreting glands is in this work investigated through-
out the animal kingdom, from the embryonic to the
perfect state, and their relation traced to the blood-
vessels and ducts, resulting in the finest piece of work
of the kind since the days of the great Italian physicist
and anatomist, Malpighi (1628-1694).

No sooner had all this been accomplished than Miiller
threw himself into a new department of experimental
physiological investigations on the nerves, the blood,
and the lymph (1831-1832). In connection with his
work on the lymph, he made a very important discovery,
which formed the subject of his first communication
to our Royal Society (1832), of which he was to become,
a little later, one of the most distinguished foreign
members, and, subsequently, a Copley medallist. This
was the discovery of the existence of lymph-hearts
in Batrachians.

Considering how much the frog's anatomy had been
studied, and how attention had already been drawn to
the lymph-sacs, situated between the skin and the
muscles, it is remarkable that these hearts, which are
so conspicuous now that we know where to look for
them, had altogether escaped observation. In the
subcutaneous sacs of a frog, the lymph is usually found
in abundance, and will flow pretty freely when the
skin is cut, continuing fluid for ten minutes and then
coagulating. By this means, as Miiller observed,
lymph can be exhibited to students, a matter of some
importance, for medical men had then very rarely an
opportunity of seeing it in the whole course of their
lives. Now these lymph-sacs are provided with two
pairs of pulsating organs — lymphatic hearts as Miiller
called them — only the posterior pair of which was first
discovered by the great physiologist, the anterior pair
being found a little later simultaneously by himself and
by the Italian Panizza, thus showing by what a series
of steps comparatively simple facts come to be ascer-

109 I*

6 Johannes Muller

tained, even under the scalpel of the ablest investi-
gators. Muller observed that the contractions of these
hearts are neither synchronous with the motions of the
heart proper nor with those of the lungs, but are peculiar
to the organs themselves ; for they continue after the
removal of the heart and even after the dismember-
ment of the animal. He was on this occasion able
to set forth clearly the movements of the lymph and its
connection with the venous system.

Miiller's first work on the natural history and com-
parative anatomy of Vertebrates dealt with the
Batrachians, called by him Amphibia nuda. His
discovery, in 1831, of the spiracula in a young Caecilian
preserved in the Leyden Museum, settled the then contro-
verted question as to the position of these wormlike crea-
tures in the system, as the fact that they undergo meta-
morphoses had not been established before. He also
contributed about the same time to our knowledge of
the structure of this class of animals, and based a
classification of the frogs and toads on the condition of
the auditory organ, a classification which, however, did
not reflect their natural relationships. This work was
chiefly carried out in the Paris Museum, the duplicates
in which establishment were placed at his disposal
by Cuvier. In a letter to his friend Retzius, dated
November 14, 1831, Muller writes how delighted he
was with the treasures in that Museum, then the
greatest in the world, and how pleasant Cuvier had
made himself to him, telling his assistant Laurillard
" Donnez a ce Monsieur tout ce qu'il voudra." The
intention which Muller then expressed of publishing
monographs of some of the more interesting genera of
frogs was never carried out.

Mutter's reputation as an investigator and teacher
had risen high, when the death of Rudolphi in
November, 1832, left the chair of Anatomy and Phy-
siology in Berlin vacant, and opened a new field

Johannes Muller 7

for his activity. At Easter, 1833, when only thirty-one
years of age, he replaced Rudolphi as Professor in
Ordinary, and a year later he was elected into the
Berlin Academy — a well-earned reward for such a
remarkable career, and a good fortune for the Univer-
sity, of which he was to be the shining light for
exactly a quarter of a century.

He had not been many months in Berlin when appeared
the first part of his celebrated Handbuch der Physiologic,
completed in 1840, which was to be for many years the
standard treatise on this vast subject, went through
several editions, and was translated into English and
French. This was regarded as the most valuable
general work on physiology which had appeared since
Mailer's Elementa (1757-1766). Indeed, as stated in
the obituary notice which appeared in the Proceedings
of the Royal Society for 1858, " the two great phy-
siological writers have much in common. In both we
see the same earnest purpose of placing the doctrine of
physiology on a basis of fact, the same constant en-
deavour to extend and consolidate this foundation, or
test its validity, by materials and methods placed at
their command by their accomplishment in the cognate
and collateral sciences. Anatomy, human and com-
parative, experiments on animals, chemistry, and phy-
sical science in its various departments, are all brought
to bear in the investigation of physiological truth.

"Mtiller's work is, moreover, enriched throughout
with the fruits of the author's own observation and
experimental inquiry, which are, sometimes, it is true,
given with a detail better suited for a separate memoir
than for a chapter in a handbook, but which signally
enhance its value as an original source of information.
Almost every part of the book affords evidence of
this, but it is enough to refer specially to the examina-
tion of the blood, the disquisition on the nervous
system, and the valuable experimental investigations

III

8 Johannes Mutter

on the voice and hearing. Here, as in his other
writings, it is characteristic of Miiller that he takes
nothing on trust ; every statement, whether of matter
of fact or doctrine, is thoroughly sifted. Difficulties,
however perplexing, are never evaded or slurred over ;
defects, however they may deface the picture to be
presented, are never disguised. Every question is
resolutely attacked ; the result, whether success or
failure, is honestly told ; and there is no yielding to
the temptation, so powerful with writers of systems,
of rounding off a rugged subject with smooth plausi-
bilities."

On the completion of his Handbuch, Miiller received
from the King of Prussia the gold medal for Art and
Science. Miiller is unquestionably the greatest physio-
logist of the first half of the last century, and on the
occasion of the award of the Copley Medal in 1854,
the President of the Royal Society observed that " no
one has borne a more conspicuous part in the advance-
ment of physiological science for the last quarter of
a century than Johannes Miiller." Yet no less great
are his merits as a morphologist. So greatly have
the domains of these two branches of biology been
extended, to no small extent through his own influence,
that he will no doubt have been the last in the history
of Science to combine eminence in both animal physi-
ology and morphology. He himself, in the second half
of his career, felt the burden to be too heavy for his
shoulders, and as he advanced in years he devoted
himself more and more exclusively to the latter
department, leaving the former to his eminent pupil,
E. du Bois-Reymond, on whom fell the honour of
delivering before the Berlin Academy of Sciences the
beautiful obituary discourse from which the writer
of these pages has freely drawn in preparing this
sketch.

It has often been objected to Miiller that, in the

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Johannes Mutter g

course of his physiological demonstrations, he abstained
from vivisection of warm-blooded animals at a time when
these were constantly sacrificed in other schools, and
where hands stained with the blood of dogs and rabbits
were for a time regarded as one of the necessary
attributes of an up-to-date physiologist. Although he
did not hesitate to perform occasional vivisections in
his private laboratory, he felt diffidence at availing him-
self of such a privilege except for the solution of
problems of great importance.

Absorbed as he was in so many occupations, Miiller
yet found time to contribute, from 1834 to 1844,
annual reports on the progress of anatomy and physi-
ology, which, although he was helped in later years by
collaborators, must have entailed an enormous amount
of reading and hunting up, and the fact that he added
critical remarks to the contributions which he reviewed
must have been the cause of no small amount of un-
pleasantness. These reports were published in the
Archiv fur Anatomic, Physiologic und Wissenschaftliche
Median, of which he took up the editorship in 1834.
Long known as Mullens Archiv, this important periodical,
since divided into two sections, is still in existence.

Availing himself of the great discovery of his pupil
Schwann in 1837, Miiller applied the microscope to
the investigation of morbid growths in man, and
started the work which, continued by Virchow and
other pupils, was the foundation of the celebrated
Berlin school of pathological anatomy. Schwann, it
may be mentioned in passing, the founder of the cell-
theory, was all his life a faithful Catholic, and held for
some time a chair in the University of Louvain, where
cellular biology was to occupy so important a place
through the impulse of Carnoy — a position which has
been maintained to the present day under the teaching
of Canon Gregoire, one of the most distinguished of
modern cytologists.

io Johannes Mutter

From 1836 starts a new era in the scientific work of
Miiller, that of publications on the morphology and
classification of Vertebrates, especially Fishes, which
for a few years were the chief object of his researches.
It was no small surprise to his contemporaries to find
the great physiologist suddenly taking the first place
among systematic ichthyologists. Whilst finishing his
text-book of physiology, his attention was attracted to
a singular type of fish from New Zealand and the Cape
of Good Hope, somewhat allied to, but even lower
in organisation than the lampreys, which he named
Bdellostoma Forsteri (the Petromyzon cirratus of Forster),
and which, as he said, was of particular importance to
the morphologist as representing the lowest type of
fish, thus standing at the very base of the Vertebrate
branch. He soon found out, through his friends the
Scandinavian naturalists Eschricht and Retzius, that a
closely related form, the hag-fish or borer, Myxine
glutinosa, was to be procured in plenty from the North
Sea, and thus provided with ample material he started
on a series of papers on the Myxinoids, which extended
over a period of eight years (1836-1843), the whole
organisation of these fishes being dealt with in
succession. The Cyclostomes, or Marsipobranchs,
embracing the hag-fish and the lampreys, had hitherto
been regarded as a group of cartilaginous fishes related
to the Selachians, or sharks and rays. Miiller was able
to show how fundamentally they differ from them.
They are now considered by many authorities as
deserving to be removed from the fishes to constitute a
separate class (Agnatha).

Miiller was soon to find a still lower type of
Vertebrates, on which to throw the light of his acumen,
the Amphioxus. The history of this little creature is an
interesting one.

It was described and figured for the first time in
1778 by the German zoologist Pallas, from a specimen

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Johannes Mutter i l

preserved in spirit which had been obtained on the
coast of Cornwall. Pallas took it for a slug, and
named it Limax lanceolatus. Nothing more was heard
about it until 1834, when an Italian naturalist, Costa,
rediscovered it in the Gulf of Naples, and regarding it
as a fish allied to the Cyclostomes, and mistaking the
curious tentacle-like cirri which form a fringe round
its mouth for respiratory filaments or gills, proposed
for it the misleading name Branchiostoma. It was next
found on the English coast by Yarrell, who described
it in 1836 under the name of Amphioxus, which name,
against the rule of priority, has been adopted by most
subsequent writers. A little later the study of this
remarkable animal, which has a wide distribution, was
taken up by Goodsir, of Edinburgh, by Rathke, of
Konigsberg, and by Johannes Miiller, whose work
deserves to be regarded as a masterpiece. Curiously,
the publications of these three authors appeared in the
same year (1841). Miiller had himself collected a
quantity of specimens in Sweden, and later he found at
Naples enormous numbers, which could be easily
picked up when bathing, and, after making renewed
observations on living specimens, preserved a couple of
thousand in spirit. He agreed with Costa in pronounc-
ing Amphioxus to be a fish, which although somehow
allied to the Cyclostomes differs from them to a greater
extent than a fish differs from an amphibian. A few
years later (1847) he was able to add an account of the
larval form from a specimen obtained by him at
Helsingfors.

In 1866 the Russian zoologist Kowalevsky published
the results of his researches on the development of
Amphioxus and of the Ascidians (sea-squirts), and
established the relationship existing between these two
types, the latter of which had hitherto been placed
near the molluscs or near the worms. Kowalevsky
showed that notwithstanding the great differences that

12 Johannes Muller

separate them in the perfect condition, their embryonic
development is very similar, the Ascidian larva being
provided with an elastic rod known as the notochord,
like Amphioxus and all Vertebrates, at least in the
earliest stages, and henceforth Amphioxus was removed
from the Fishes and the Ascidians from the Inverte-
brates to form a division, Protochordata, of the great
phylum Chordata, which embraces besides all Verte-
brates, from Fishes up to Mammals.

Although Muller did not hit off the exact systematic
position of the puzzling Amphioxus, yet he laid the
foundation of an accurate knowledge of its structure
and development, which was to be the starting-point of
subsequent investigations, and here again he left his
indelible stamp on one of the greatest zoological
discoveries of the nineteenth century. Space forbids
entering here into an account of the disputes to which
this Amphioxus has given rise among evolutionists,
some regarding it as a connecting link between Inverte-
brates and Vertebrates, others endeavouring to demon-
strate that it is derived by degeneration from the latter.

The work accomplished on the Cyclostomes had led
Muller to a study of the type of fish next in order, and
with the assistance of his pupil Henle, who had pre-
viously occupied himself with the Torpedoes or electric
rays, he brought out a large illustrated book dealing
with the Plagiostomes, or sharks and rays, from the
systematic standpoint — a book which is still in the hands
of all who have to study the external characters of this
important group of fishes. He also contributed an
interesting paper on a dog-fish, Mustelus Icevis, remark-
able for the connexion of its foetus with the uterus, a
fact observed by Aristotle, but not verified since.

The work by which the great naturalist is best known
as an ichthyologist is his memoir on the structure and
limits of the Ganoids, followed by a general classifica-
tion of the Fishes (1846).

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Johannes Muller 13

As the outcome of his epoch-making researches on
fossil fishes, Louis Agassiz had proposed (1833) a new
classification based on the structure of the scales
(Placoids, Ganoids, Cycloids, Ctenoids), which, although
it expressed roughly the principal steps in the evolution
of fishes from the oldest to the most recent types, was
unsatisfactory in its details, and could not be applied
without violence to the most obvious relationships of
many types brought together under three of these
primary divisions. This was particularly felt in the
case of the Ganoids, which included, besides the forms
with rhombic, enamel-coated bony scales, which are so
strikingly characteristic of the palaeozoic and mesozoic
periods, the Sturgeons, the Silurids or Cat-fish, the File-
fish and Coffer-fish, the Sea-horses and Pipe-fish, &c.

Muller undertook to put order into this chaos by
instituting a thorough examination of the anatomy of
the living representatives of Agassiz's Ganoids, with the
object of assigning to the group more definite and re-
stricted limits. He showed that the Sturgeon and Polyo-
don agree in the structure of the heart and intestine, the
disposition of the optic nerves, &c., with Polypterus and
Lepidosteus, the only living forms clad with true ganoid
scales, whilst the other forms associated with them by
Agassiz had to be removed from the group and distri-
buted among the soft-rayed and spiny-rayed Teleos-
teans. The North- American Amia was, however, over-
looked by him, and left with the Clupeids (Herring
family), where Cuvier had placed it ; it was Carl
Vogt who discovered, at the close of Miiller's investiga-
tions, that Amia also agreed with the new definition of
the Ganoids. Muller further failed to seize the relation-
ship which is now admitted to exist between the Lung-
fish or Dipnoans (Lepidosiren and Protopterm) and his
Ganoids. Ceratodus, it is true, was then only
known from fossil teeth, the discovery of the living
Neoceratodus in Queensland dating from 1870. The

117

14 Johannes Muller

differences in the skeleton which separate Polypterus
from the other Ganoids were not accorded sufficient
weight, as was recognized later by Huxley and by Cope,
who established the order Crossopterygians, now usually
regarded as of equal rank with the Ganoids and the
Dipnoans. Recent discoveries in both fossil and recent
forms have also proved fatal to Mutter's definition of
the Ganoids, and the barrier which was supposed to
separate them from the lower Teleosteans has in conse-
quence to some extent broken down. At the present
day few authorities agree exactly as to what forms con-
stitute the order Ganoids.

In dealing with the other groups of fishes, Muller
introduced many improvements in Cuvier's classification,
which Agassiz's had not succeeded in supplanting. He
was the first to establish the great and most natural
family Characinidae, the components of which had
been previously distributed among the Salmonids and
Clupeids, at the same time pointing out their affinity to
the Cyprinids and Silurids, although failing to realize
their still closer relationship to the Gymnotids, which
he left near the Eels. Abandoning the division of
Agassiz into Cycloids and Ctenoids, he still attached
too much importance to this scale-character in some
of his groupings — in the Pharyngognathi, for instance,
an entirely artificial association of Teleosteans with
united lower pharyngeal bones, the establishment of
which he looked upon with some pride, but which was
soon to be upset. His application of the character of
the presence or absence of a pneumatic duct to the
swim-bladder for a definition of higher groups was a
step in advance, although the subsequent discovery of
exceptions has lessened its utility from a taxonomic
point of view.

Like all systems, Mulier's classification of fishes has
been replaced by others, and little remains of it in the
modern attempts at a phylogenetic arrangement ; but it

118

Johannes Mutter 15

had endured a longer spell than any of its predecessors,
to which it was superior in the expression of natural
relationships. No higher compliment could be paid to
any of our modern classifications.

With the collaboration of one of his assistants —
Troschel — Muller started, in 1845, a fine illustrated
work — Horce Ichihyologicce — containing descriptions and
figures of various fishes, the third and last part of
which appeared in 1849.

In the early forties Muller threw himself with enthu-
siasm into the study of bird anatomy, with the special
object of improving the then very artificial classification
which was based partly on the mode of life, partly on
external characters, such as the bill and feet, which
reflected the habits. As Audubon had said, the time
had come when the results obtained from an inspection
of the exterior alone had to be laid aside. In dealing
with the enormous group of the Passerines, Muller
availed himself for the first time of the condition of
the larynx and song-muscles to establish three great
tribes among them — an arrangement which, whatever
its shortcomings, constituted a great step in advance.
His work did not appear in complete form until 1847.
In the words of the late Professor Newton, this very
remarkable treatise forms the groundwork of almost all
later or recent researches in the comparative anatomy
and consequent arrangement of Passerine birds, and
though it is certainly not free from imperfections, many
of them, it must be said, arose from want of material.

In criticizing the taxonomic work of Johannes
Muller, it must be borne in mind that the almost
universal acceptance of the evolutionary or derivation
theory, of which we find a hint in the writings of St.
Augustine, has completely revolutionized the principles
of classification. The motto inscribed on one of
Linna3us's portraits, Dem creavit, Linnaeus disposuit, ex-
presses the conception of his contemporaries. The

119

1 6 Johannes Miiller

aim of the classificator was to discover the order and
sequence which had characterized the separate acts of
the Creator of all things. Hence the purpose of the
taxonomist was to avail himself of such characters as
stood in direct relation to the economy of the
creatures ; and the so-called natural systems which
soon followed and replaced Linnaeus's tentative and
artificial scheme, were mainly physiological, the charac-
ters selected as of the highest importance being those
which best reflected the mode of life, in connection
with the gradual perfection of the different forms in
one great ascending series. Modern taxonomists, on
the contrary, distrust the more obviously adaptive
characters, such as are of least importance from a
physiological standpoint being often' the most valuable
from the phylogenetic .point of view. How much
Miiller was inclined to lay more stress on physiological
characters appears from his remark in a letter to
Retzius in 1839, when the systematic position of the
newly discovered lung-fishes was being discussed : " an
animal with a larynx, a trachea, and lungs can be no
fish " ; yet soon after he had to accept their position.

In 1847 Miiller took up the study of a gigantic fossil
animal, regarded by some as a lizard (Basilosaums), by
others as a sea-snake (Hydrarchus), the teeth of which
had already been correctly referred by Owen to a
marine mammal (Zeuglodon). Whilst Miiller was
busily at work on this perplexing creature, another
German zoologist, Burmeister, was able to prove it to
have been a Cetacean, the precursor of our modern
toothed whales or dolphins. The researches of Miiller
were published in a folio volume with twenty-seven
plates in 1849. I*1 ^ne department of mammalian
palaeontology he also wrote on the structure of the
foot of the edentate Glyptodon.

From about this time Miiller spent all his holidays at
the seaside, to unravel the mysteries of marine inverte-

I2O

Johannes Miiller 17

brate life, a branch of study which has since been so
greatly cultivated, thanks to the numerous seaside
laboratories which have sprung up within the last
forty years.

At the time of his Amphioxus studies, he had been
twice to Sweden. In the summers of 1845 and 1846
he went to Heligoland, where he studied the metamor-
phoses of star-fish and urchins ; late in the autumn of
1848 to Ostend ; early in the following year to Mar-
seilles, where he paid special attention to Holothurians,
another type of Echinoderms. During the Easter
vacation of 1851 the Echinoderm investigations were
resumed at Trieste, and led to one of the most startling
discoveries of his whole career, that of the Gastropod
mollusc Entoconcha, parasitic in the genital gland of the
Holothurian Synapta digitaia, causing its abortion, the
first discovered case of parasitic castration. However,
he did not from the outset reach the correct interpreta-
tion of the facts before him ; the parasite was believed
to be an organ of its host ; ideas of alternate genera-
tion, the discovery of which had just been made by
Steenstrup, and confirmed by Loven, Sars, and others,
however improbable in this case, haunted his mind ; he
felt so perplexed, even bewildered, at the mere thought
of facts so contrary to the ascertained laws of
nature, which, had the interpretation which seemed to
him the most obvious been correct, would have upset
the very foundations of the zoological system, that, far
from experiencing that satisfaction which every new
discovery had hitherto brought him, he wished he
could have dismissed the whole thing as a nightmare.

As this story of the Entoconcha is one of the great
curiosities in the history of Zoology, I shall endeavour
to tell it briefly. Holothurians are worm-like Echi-
noderms with a soft or leathery sac-like skin with
calcareous deposits, and an anterior mouth surrounded
with tentacles. One of these creatures, Synapta

121

1 8 Johan nes Mutter

digitata, first discovered on the English coast, was
found by Miiller in great abundance in the Bay of
Mazzia, at Trieste. In his previous work on the
Echinoderms, he had given an account of its anatomy
from spirit specimens, and de Quatrefages had dis-
covered another species of the same genus to be
hermaphrodite. When, at the beginning of the year,
great numbers of these Holothurians were procured
at Trieste, ova were found in all of them, thus affording
confirmation of de Quatrefages's discovery. In summer,
when Miiller returned to Trieste to continue his
investigations, he met for the first time with an indi-
vidual totally different in its generative organ, and he
began to doubt the hermaphroditism of the Synaptce,
thinking this to be a male. What was his surprise,
however, when, having had large numbers brought to
him daily, he found among them an individual in which
the anomalous genital organ contained capsules in-
cluding young snails with spiral shells. This was the
commencement of the researches which he prosecuted
uninterruptedly for two months, in the course of which
he observed sixty-nine times the presence of molluscs
or mollusc-eggs in this Holothurian. He soon found
out that these aberrant individuals could be easily
distinguished externally from the others, the semi-
transparency of the body permitting an observer to see
whether it contains the normal ovarium or the thick
molluscigerous " organ," a sac which nowise resembles
that of the ordinary generative organs. One part of
the molluscigerous sac contains the male elements, the
other the female, in numerous separate capsules.
Miiller was able to follow out the fecundation and
development of the ova, which closely agreed with the
same in certain molluscs. The new creature, which he
named Entoconcha mirabilis, was certainly a snail, with
a spiral shell, but, beyond the fact that it was a
Gastropod, he could not fix its position in the system.

122

Johannes Milller 19

"That the molluscs are developed within the
Holothuria," he said in his first communication to
the Berlin Academy, which was translated and com-
mented upon by an anonymous writer who was to
become one of the greatest zoologists — Huxley, "is
clearly made out ; how it is possible that they are so
developed, I know not. All that I know is the fact,
and the mode in which it occurs ; and I may further
add, that it is impossible the molluscs should have been
introduced from without. The Holothurian has not
eaten them, for it eats nothing but fine earthy mud,
and nothing else is ever found in the intestine ; and
even if it had, how could they get out of the intestine
into the abdominal cavity and the molluscigerous sac ?
Neither have they crept into the abdominal cavity of
the Syw0/>/fl-fragments, for all these are spasmodically
contracted at their extremities, so that nothing can either
pass from or into tnat cavity with its normally contained
saline fluid. Besides, how could a thousand or more
molluscs creep in, particularly as they must have
entered as yolks ? Neither have they crept into the
sac from without, since they have arisen from their
elements in it. It follows that the sac must either
itself be the equivalent of a mollusc, a vermiform
metamorphosis of a mollusc as it were, which has made
its way into the Holothuria ; or it must be an organ of
the Holothuria, which instead of Holothuriae produces
molluscs. . . . The whole difficulty, however, does not
consist in conceiving the sac to be an animal. A great
difficulty for every theory is that the molluscigerous sac
is organically connected with the Holothuria. . . . Has
this sac, then, perhaps arisen as a bud in the Holothuria,
remaining in connection with it, and perhaps having
the same relation to the production of the molluscs as
the proembryo of certain plants has to their production ?
Against this view, however, we have ;the fact that the
sac opens at the same place as the ordinary generative

123

2O Johannes Miiller

organs of the Holothuria. Perhaps it jis a case of the
alternation of generations, the Holothuria producing
molluscs, from which again Holothuriae are produced,
though it is highly improbable that the alternation of
generation ever goes so far ; and besides, the Holo-
thuria has its own peculiar mode of reproduction, its
own ova, with whose product, indeed, we are not yet
acquainted, but which indubitably is wholly different
from a mollusc, and without question is again a
Synapta."

After suggesting various speculations to which these
facts might give rise, Miiller did not commit himself
to any definite conclusion, but leant towards re-
garding the case discovered by him as one of " hetero-
genous generation," that is, the production by a given
species of offspring similar to itself, and of offspring
dissimilar to itself, by true sexual generation, pointing
out that this process is very distinct from the alternation
of generations and suggesting that it may explain the
mode of introduction of new species upon the surface of
our planet, for Miiller believed like Cuvier in separate
successive creations, as palaeontology then seemed to
prove.

Such extraordinary suggestions were not likely to
pass without challenge on the part of even Miiller's
greatest admirers, but he himself very soon came
round, especially after having discovered, after his
return from Trieste, that some specimens of Synapta,
which he had preserved in spirit, possessed both the
normal genital organ and the molluscigerous sac. Six
weeks after his first communication, from which we
have quoted above, he wrote a modified account for
his Archiv, in which, whilst still regarding the solution
of the problem as impossible, he allowed more weight
to the probability of the parasitic nature of the mol-
luscigerous sac, adding "that possibly our mollusc
may never be discovered in the adult state, but that,

124

Johannes Mutter 21

after a short life as such, it may cast off shell and
operculum and change into a parasitic worm, a
hermaphrodite mollusc-generator." Now Miiller was
near the truth, and although he did not himself
pursue his researches further, others followed the
course which he recommended, that a further in-
vestigation must proceed upon the basis of what
we know, and explanation must be sought in the
common course of Nature."

Writing to Retzius, May 21, 1852, he tells him he
is quite upset by this " snail business." Yet he has
got so far as to feel certain that the sac is not an
organ of the Holothurian, but a separate animal, a
view which is adopted in his final memoir on the
subject, published late in 1852.

It is now established, by the researches of A. Baur,
published in 1864, that Entoconcha mirabilis is the
larva of a degenerate parasitic Gastropod, so degraded
as to consist of a mere tubular sac without nervous
system, with just a vestige of intestinal canal and
distinct testis and ovary, settling in the genital gland
of Synapta digitata, which in course of time it absorbs
and supplants. As in many degraded creatures, the
larva is much more highly organized than the adult,
and departs less from the normal pattern of the group
to which it pertains.

The question as to how the parasite penetrates into
the Holothurian and how its progeny is released has
not yet been solved, although from analogy with a
related species discovered since, N. R. Harrington
(1897) has concluded that the larva is free-swimming
and enters the host with the water taken into the
respiratory system.

The work done by Miiller on the Echinoderms and
published between 1840 and his death is considerable.
He has investigated the larval conditions of four out of
the five orders which constitute this class, and deter-

125

22 Johannes Mutter

mined the common plan followed in their development ;
he has described the anatomy of recent Crinoids,
elucidated fossil remains of the same order, and dealt
with the systematic arrangement of the Asterids, finally
subjecting the organization of the entire class of
Echinoderms, both recent and fossil, to a thorough
revision. His last paper (March, 1858) was on some
fossil Echinoderms from Germany. Shortly before
(1857) he had added to our knowledge of the develop-
ment of the Pteropod molluscs.

We have now reviewed the most salient of Miiller's
publications. A few words, to conclude, on the man him-
self during the years of his Berlin professorship. Rather
stiff and reserved, impatient of idle talk, and perhaps
too much concentrated in his work, as needs must be in
a man who, in the space of thirty-five years brought out
twenty-four books and about ten times as many memoirs
and papers ranging over an enormous field of knowledge,
the Professor was inaccessible to ordinary students ; but
he was an ideal master to his privileged pupils, many of
whom have attained high eminence in science. Although
rather taciturn at home, he was a most devoted hus-
band and father, sharing with his family the pleasures
of his holidays, which, in the latter half of his career,
were devoted, as we have seen above, to visits to distant
seaside places for the furtherance of his zoological
pursuits. Sometimes he would allow one or two of his
favourite pupils to accompany him on such expeditions —
with fatal results on the last occasion, September, 1855,
when the ship which was to bring him home from
Norway was wrecked and one of his young companions,
a Dr. Schmidt, drowned, Miiller fortunately escaping by
swimming and clinging to floating wreckage. He
never quite recovered from the shock, and never again
set foot on a boat.

Miiller was no orator, but his lectures were impressive
for the thorough mastery he possessed over the subject

126

Johannes Muller 23

of his exposition, aided by graphic demonstrations on
the blackboard. For he was an accomplished draughts-
man ; the beautiful plates of many of his publications,
drawn by himself, testify to his talent. He was also an
expert at photography, a rare attainment in those days.

The honour of the rectorate of the Berlin University
twice fell on him, a serious burden on the second
occasion, in 1848, when his prestige was invaluable
during the revolution which had broken out in the
capital of Prussia. He himself kept guard over the
University buildings opposite the royal palace, and
succeeded in protecting them from the devastations of
riotous students.

Muller was a vitalist, and remained so to the end of
his days, although avoiding controversy on a question on
which he was attacked even by two of his most dis-
tinguished pupils and friends, du Bois-Reymond and
Schwann, and which had been brought to the front by
the latter's epoch-making discovery of the cell-theory.
Muller felt justly enough that such a question was out-
side the limitations of experimental physiology ; and,
absorbed as he then was in his morphological work, he
abstained from taking part in the disputes over the
theory of life which sprang up towards the close of his
career.

In fact, as he advanced in age and honours, Muller
became more and more averse to public controversy,
and lost much of the somewhat proud and overbearing
manner he had shown, in earlier years, towards some
of his confreres. The tone in which, in 1837, he had
replied to the attacks of Friedrich Arnold, was for him,
in later years, a subject of frequent regret, as he con-
fided to a friend.

Early in his scientific life, Muller had given up philo-
sophical speculation in his writings, the perusal of which
often rather conveys materialistic tendencies. His
saying, in reference to his own studies, that " nothing

127

24 Johannes Milller

is worth knowing that does not fall under the scalpel "
has often been quoted, although it was repudiated by
him later in life. Still, he does not seem to have ever
dissociated himself from the religion in which he was
brought up, and, speaking at his funeral, the episcopal
delegate, Provost Pelldram, of St. Hedwig's, his parish
priest, afterwards Bishop of Treves, describes him as
a man who " both in church and at home served his
God faithfully, admiring His wisdom and majesty all
the more as he penetrated into the depths of science."

From 1828 to 1856 Miiller had enjoyed robust and
uninterrupted health. He prided himself on being able
to settle down to sleep at any time of the day or night
and thus recoup himself from the fatigue of his prodi-
gious work. But towards the end of 1856, after having
suffered from insomnia, he was laid up with gastric
fever, followed by arthritis in the foot. He recovered,
but was never himself again, and as the summer term of
1858 approached, he made up his mind to give up his
lectures. He could not discover what was the matter
with his health, but he felt so alarmed that he asked his
doctor to come and discuss matters with him on April
28th. On the morning of that day, he was found dead in
his bed. As he had left instructions forbidding a post-
mortem, the cause of his death was not ascertained.
His funeral took place on May 2nd, amidst an enormous
concourse of representatives of the State, the University,
and scientific bodies, and with the prayers of Holy
Church. His remains were buried in the Catholic
Cemetery in Liedenstrasse.

A statue erected to his memory in his native town
was unveiled in October, 1899.

128

SIR DOMINIC CORRIGAN

(1802-1880)

SIR FRANCIS R. CRUISE, M.D., D.L., K.S.G., LL.D.,

Honorary Physician in Ordinary to His Majesty King George V.
in Ireland.

THE lives of the good and great are as lamps to our feet,
to guide and help us on our earthly pilgrimage. Never
was a life more illustrative of this fact than that of Sir
Dominic John Corrigan. My only fear in attempting
to sketch it lies in my own unworthiness. Still, I must
make the attempt. So much of my earlier life — from
1854 until Sir Dominic's death in 1880 — was spent in
close association with him, that I feel not only anxious,
but bound, to record the love and gratitude I owe him,
and the deep reverence in which I hold his memory.

Dominic John Corrigan was born in Dublin on the
2nd of December 1802. His father, John Corrigan, and
his mother, Celia O' Conor Corrigan, lived at that time in
a house in Thomas Street, the site of which is now occu-
pied by the church of St. Augustine. They also owned
a fee-simple property and cottage called " The Lodge "
at Kilmainham. John Corrigan was a man of great
intelligence and energy, and, not content to live upon
the profits of his farm, he entered into commerce in the
sale of agricultural implements, wishing to meet a want
he had noticed among the labourers flocking to Dublin
on their way to England. His wife was of rare talent
and fcfeauty, a cousin of The O' Conor Don of that period,
and descendant therefore of an Irish royal race.
7 129 i

2 Sir Dominic Corrigan

John Corrigan prospered in business and was able to
give the best possible education to his family. The
eldest son, Patrick, went early to America and married
there. One of his daughters became a distinguished
member of the Loreto Order at Niagara, and two of his
grand-daughters became nuns in the Sacred Heart Order
in New York. Next to Patrick came Dominic John,
the second son. A third son, Robert, who was brilliantly
clever, went out to settle in New Orleans, where he died
of yellow fever a fortnight after arrival. Of three
daughters, Mary and Celia married ; the third, Eliza,
became a Carmelite nun.

The youthful Dominic was sent as a pupil to the Lay
College of Maynooth, at that time a foremost Catholic
educational institution in Ireland, where he soon dis-
tinguished himself in his studies, and especially by his
taste for Physical Science. Owing to this he was con-
stantly employed in assisting the Professor of Natural
Philosophy, and became an expert therein. The Pro-
fessor was the Rev. Cornelius Denvir, afterwards Bishop
of Down and Connor, and the life-long devoted friend
of his illustrious pupil.

Very early Corrigan made the acquaintance of Dr.
O' Kelly, Resident Physician to the College, a very
remarkable man, to whom he was subsequently bound
apprentice, according to the custom of those days. Dr.
O'Kelly was so struck by the ability and industry of the
youth that he advised and urged his father to send him
to Edinburgh to study medicine. At that time the
University of the Scottish capital enjoyed a world-wide
reputation, second to none.

His medical studies completed, Corrigan took the
degree of Doctor of Medicine at the early age of twenty-
three, in the year 1825. The subject of his thesis was
"Scrofula." That same year another great Irish
physician, the late Dr. William Stokes, also graduated
in Edinburgh.

130

Sir Dominic Corrigan 3

In 1825 the youthful Dr. Corrigan returned to Dublin,
commenced his professional life in the house No. 13
Bachelor's Walk, and forthwith devoted himself, with
the ability and energy which marked and moulded his
entire career, to the study and practice of his profession,
and especially to the work of teaching, wherein he rapidly
attained a foremost place. In addition to a clearness
of perception which amounted almost to intuition, he
possessed an extraordinary gift of conveying his know-
ledge to others. Of this, as one of his pupils, I can speak
from experience. I believe it would be impossible for
anyone who did not live and struggle for success in the
medical profession at the period when Corrigan began,
to form an idea of the difficulties which beset a
Catholic in the effort to attain it in Dublin. However,
as we shall see later on, Corrigan was able to do so
brilliantly by his ability and dauntless courage.

Fairly launched in his native city, Corrigan followed
up in full earnest the studies he had commenced in
Edinburgh, and highly educated as he was at Maynooth
Lay College in Latin, Greek, French, and Physical
Science, he attended assiduously at Sir Patrick Dun's
Hospital the clinical lectures delivered there in Latin
by Dr. Toomey, an eminent Dublin physician and
professor of the time. Very early in life he was for-
tunate enough to obtain the post of physician to Jervis
Street Hospital, an excellent although somewhat limited
field for the exercise of his talents. For this appoint-
ment he was obliged, according to the custom of the
institution, to contribute a large sum of money to its
funds, even though the number of beds at his disposal
was only six.

Never was capital better invested, for with careful
selection of cases, and devoted attention to them, he
laid the foundation of his unsurpassed reputation as a
clinical physician, pathologist, and teacher. The two
famous essays which demonstrated his genius as an

131 i*

4 Sir Dominic Corrigan

original observer and pioneer in pathology were written
during his tenure of office in Jervis Street Hospital.
About that period he occupied in succession the Pro-
fessorship of Medicine in Digges Street School, in Peter
Street School, and later in the Richmond Hospital
School, which subsequently was named " The Car-
michael" in memory of its illustrious founder. So
popular and sought after were his lectures in these
Medical Schools, that the great difficulty was to find
accommodation for the crowds which flocked to hear
them. In 1831 Corrigan was elected Consulting Physi-
cian to the famous Catholic College of Maynooth, and
held that honourable and most influential position until
1866, when pressure of work obliged him to resign.

In addition, Corrigan filled for some years the post of
Visiting Physician to Cork Street Hospital, where he
acquired much of that profound knowledge of fever
which is exhibited in his famous lectures on that subject,
to which I shall refer later. Besides this vast and well-
tilled field of clinical study, Corrigan was a diligent
reader, and mastered the best literature on medical
topics in English, French, and Latin, Morgagni's great
work, De sedibus causisque morborum, being his chosen
favourite. A maxim which he often impressed upon his
pupils was — " Choose your one text-book of practical
medicine, and let your own clinical records be the
commentary to prove its accuracy or otherwise."

The independence of thought thus formulated found
expression in his own remarkable original investigations
and discoveries. In the year 1832, when just thirty
years of age, Corrigan produced his essay on " Permanent
Patency of the Aortic Valves." This work — published
in the Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal — as a
matter of fact exhausted a difficult and complex subject,
leaving no phase unexplained, and brought him great
and lasting distinction ; so high an authority as Trous-
seau, whose appreciation of Irish merit was profound,

132

Sir Dominic Corrigan 5

designating the condition described as the " Maladie de
Corrigan." This great compliment has not been for-
gotten in France, for I, when following the clinique of
the celebrated Dr. Henri Bernheim, in the H6pital Civil
at Nancy, in 1890, heard him refer to a case in his ward
as an illustration of the " Maladie de Corrigan de Dublin."
I may mention here a very interesting incident anent
the topic in question. Corrigan travelled a great deal,
always visiting the hospitals in his tours. Once, when
in Paris, going round the wards with the physician on
duty, they came to a patient whose ailment was tabu-
lated as the "Maladie de Corrigan." The doctor,
turning to his guest, whose card he had received, asked
him if he knew Corrigan of Dublin. " C'est moi, Mon-
sieur," was the prompt reply. Enchanted to find who
his guest was, the doctor led him to the lecture theatre
and presented him to the class, and a right royal recep-
tion was given to the illustrious visitor.

Six years after the appearance of the essay on aortic
valve disease, Corrigan produced a second striking
treatise on that peculiar form of chronic inflammatory
induration of the lung which he named " Cirrhosis."
In this paper — published in the Dublin Quarterly Journal
of Medical Science in 1838 — he pointed out clearly the
distinction between that disease and tubercular phthisis,
with which it had previously often been confounded.
In the light of modern pathological investigation his
views on this subject become more meritorious than ever,
and continue to be regarded as the first step in the right
direction, anticipating modern conclusions by fully
half a century. Alluding to these two essays, Sir Philip
Crampton, in an address delivered at the Royal College
of Surgeons of Ireland in 1838, stated that they placed
Corrigan in the very foremost rank of pathologists.

The production of these essays, based on personal
observation and confirmed by post-mortem examination,
at so early an age, demonstrate the high order of

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6 Sir Dominic Corrigan

genius which inspired their author. It is not to be
wondered at, then, that Corrigan rose rapidly in the
estimation of the profession and the public, that practice
flowed in to him ; and we find that his position entitled
him so early as 1834 to move from Bachelor's Walk to the
house in Merrion Square West which he occupied as his
town residence to the end of his life. Later on, when his
vast practice and large income justified it, he built a
beautiful seaside residence at Dalkey, some nine miles
from Dublin, and there spent each summer. He named
it Inniscorrig, and made it a place of such rest as the
demands on his time permitted. No one who enjoyed
the delightful afternoons and evenings spent there with
him and his charming family could ever forget them and
their gifted host.

We next find that in 1840 — on the death of Dr. John
Crampton — he was elected to the post of Physician to the
great Hospitals of the House of Industry, the medical
portion of which consisted of the Whitworth Medical
and Hardwicke Fever Hospitals. Now, at last, he had a
field for observation and teaching worthy of his ability,
and well he used it. Eight o'clock every morning found
him in the wards, recording, explaining, and lecturing
upon the cases, followed by a large and most attentive
class of students. This practice he carried out for years :
in fact, until his necessary pressing engagements rendered
it impossible. It would be difficult to say which was
most prized— his teaching at the bedside, or his systematic
courses of lectures on the practice of medicine. Both —
admirably illustrated — attracted round him such a
crowd of pupils and young practitioners that the great
difficulty was to obtain space in the hospital wards or
the lecture theatre.

The Hardwicke Hospital, filled with fever cases of all
description and variety, supplied the material for his
splendid lectures on these diseases, and the attention
devoted to the study of the cases was guarantee for the

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Sir Dominic Corrigan 7

accuracy of his views to the minutest details. In 1853,
the year before I became a student of medicine, Corrigan
published these lectures in book form.

It would be impossible in a short space to give a review
of this work, one of the ablest I ever met, and most
characteristic of its author. It was not intended as an
exhaustive treatise on fever, but rather as a guide to
help the student to study that protean malady. Pro-
bably no subject presents such difficulty and bewilder-
ment to a beginner in medicine as the febrile state,
which enters so largely into most morbid conditions, and
in such strange and confusing forms ; but anyone who
masters Corrigan's lectures on fever is forthwith placed
in a position to enter intelligently upon this very complex
study. To the last day of life he must persevere in study-
ing and learning more and more about it ; but the grand
principles of diagnosis and treatment are clearly set
forth, in perfect simplicity, in Corrigan's lectures. I can
never forget the effect they had upon me, in my third
year of pupilage, when I had the good fortune to be
selected by Corrigan to take up duty as his resident
clinical clerk. It is also to be remembered, to the
author's credit, that at a period when typhus, and
enteric or typhoid fever, were so often confounded, he
saw clearly the fundamental difference between them
and laid it down in his lectures. For this achievement
he was indebted to his diligence in pathological investi-
gation. The Pathological Society was founded in 1836,
and gave Corrigan a matchless opportunity for demon-
strating his thorough knowledge of morbid anatomy,
and its relation to disease in its various forms. It met
weekly during the winter sessions, and seldom was a meet-
ing held without some valuable communication being
made by him. Later, in my student days, I was fascinated
by these meetings and the sound instruction they im-
parted. Still later, I often prepared the specimens under
his direction, and listened with delight to his comments

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8 Sir Dominic Corrigan

upon them. His demonstrations were lucid and explicit,
and though his language was the simplest possible, its
clearness saved it from the slightest dullness or weari-
someness.

Corrigan was ever a diligent — I may say constant —
contributor to medical literature ; but I have always
held that his masterpieces, in which his special original
genius shone, were his essays on disease of the aortic
valves, on cirrhosis of the lung, and his lectures on
fever.

At the time when I became a student of medicine — in
1854 — and first met Corrigan, he was just fifty-two years
of age, and had enjoyed for a long period a commanding
position and most lucrative practice. His professional
income then, and for very many years after, was one of
the largest — if not the largest — on record amongst Irish
physicians.

It must not be forgotten that at the period of which
I write a galaxy of medical talent, in its various depart-
ments, existed in Dublin, which made his success all the
more difficult and remarkable. Those were the days of
Graves, Marsh, Stokes, and Banks ; of Crampton,
Colles, Carmichael, Cusack, Adams, John Hamilton,
Hutton, and Robert William Smith ; of Collins, Johnson,
M'Clintock, Samuel Gordon, Montgomery, Churchill,
Beatty, Evory Kennedy, Frederick Kirkpatrick, and
many others. Corrigan was second to none, and, sur-
mounting the disabilities of what was then a down-trodden
faith, held the very highest rank.

I can never forget the first day I spoke to Corrigan in
the grounds of the Hardwicke Hospital. Of commanding
figure, very like Daniel O'Connell, his face beamed with
kindness, and his manner, if a trifle brusque, was most
fascinating. I put a question to him about a patient we
had just seen in the hospital ward, and the painstaking
manner in which he explained all I asked established
a confidence never after shaken or forgotten. Of his

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Sir Dominic Corrigan 9

subsequent kindness to me I could never speak without
emotion. If I had been a favourite son he could not have
been more partial, and, as I later found, more devoted.

His noble figure, so well delineated in Foley's grand
statue in the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland, was
such, even then, as fitted his earlier history. He had been
an athlete in his way, a splendid horseman, and a famous
rider to hounds. His courage and presence of mind
were always ready, and I may, in passing, give an
illustration.

He was a devoted student of zoology, a generous donor
and a constant visitor to the Zoological Gardens in the
Phoenix Park. On one occasion while there, a serious
accident occurred. A visitor approaching too near the
wolf's cage had his hand seized by the savage brute, who
held it tight, planting his feet against the bars of the
enclosure. Despite the efforts of a policeman standing
near, who belaboured the wolfs head with his baton, the
enraged animal held his grasp — the blood flowed copi-
ously, and the surrounding crowd were terror-stricken and
screaming. Corrigan coolly walked over to the scene,
realised the position at once, and saw the remedy. Seizing
the policeman's baton, he forced the handle, the narrow
end, between the wolf's jaws, and with a sudden twist
brought the point against the roof of its mouth. The
wolf, in agony, let go the hand and fled to a corner of
the cage howling. The poor wounded hand was then
bathed and dressed, and the sufferer sent on a car to
the Richmond Hospital.

The intimacy, begun at the very commencement of my
medical studies, increased year by year ; later I became
Corrigan' s resident pupil, and I wish I could give space
here to illustrate the kindness and generosity he displayed
towards me.

As a student, and later as a beginner in the practice
of my profession, I was closely and constantly associated
with him, ever the grateful recipient of his fine teaching

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io Sir Dominic Corrigan

and noble example, up to the day when I knelt by his
deathbed in 1880.

We have already seen something of Corrigan's genius
and originality, of his power of seeing and explaining
what others failed to see or explain ; but in addition he
was a man of extraordinary energy and work. How he
succeeded in teaching as he did, in carrying on a vast,
ever-increasing professional practice, and in lending
invaluable help in all the educational, literary, and public
work of his time, in truth passes comprehension. Yet,
withal, he moved as quietly as if he were only amusing
himself.

Besides the three masterpieces alluded to — the article
on patency of the aortic valves (in 1832) ; that on
cirrhosis of the lung (in 1838) ; and his lectures on fever
(in 1853) — he wrote ceaselessly, and never without
making valuable additions to medical knowledge.

Even before the article on aortic disease, Corrigan con-
tributed in 1829 a remarkable essay to the Lancet on the
mechanism of the "Bruit de soufflet et Fremissement
Cataire." In 1834 ne contributed to the Cyclopedia of
Practical Medicine the articles on Pemphigus, Plica
Polonica, and Rupia. In 1836 he contributed a lucid
essay on the " Bruit de cuir neuf " ; and in 1837 a paper on
aortitis as a cause of angina pectoris. In 1839 appeared
his treatise on the use of remedies in the form of vapour
in chest affections — an innovation of treatment which
originated the very abundant use of such methods subse-
quent to his time : in the same year Corrigan wrote on
the value of opium in the treatment of acute rheuma-
tism, and in 1841 appeared his admirable article on the
diagnosis and treatment of functional diseases of the
heart.

In 1846 appeared his famous pamphlet on famine and
fever as cause and effect, foretelling the coming epidemic
that swept Ireland and so notably reduced her starving
population,

138

Sir Dominic Corrigan 1 1

In 1860 — after a visit to Arcachon near Bordeaux — he
delivered a remarkable lecture at the College of Physi-
cians describing its climate, resources, and advantages
for patients suffering from pulmonary affections. I was
present at that lecture. So great was the benefit of his
advocacy of that health resort that one of the avenues
there is named after him — " Avenue de Corrigan." In
1 86 1 he visited Greece, and afterwards published a most
interesting sketch — " Ten Days in Athens." In 1866 he
republished his cholera map of Ireland, originally
brought out in 1850.

The foregoing items are only a general, and I fear
imperfect, list of Corrigan's ceaseless contributions to
medical lore ; but I should not omit his valuable advocacy
of the use of a small disc of iron, heated to a certain point
in a spirit lamp, and used for producing a mild counter-
irritation in cases of chronic rheumatism, sciatica, and
similar affections. This idea originated with Bretonneau
of Tours, but was popularized by Corrigan, and is known
as " Corrigan's button."

Sir Dominic's literary activity never flagged, and
shortly before his death he produced a startling account
of his reminiscences of the early days of dissection in
Dublin, before the introduction of Mr. Warburton's Act,
which provided that only unclaimed bodies should be
used. It so happens that I — in my student days — was
intimate with many who had taken active part in the
" resurrection " business, and whose narratives confirmed
all the horrors of the shocking scenes alluded to in
Corrigan's paper.

I believe his last essay was upon Aix-les-Bains, in
Savoy, whither I induced him to go in 1875. He derived
notable relief from his gouty troubles from that visit,
and wrote a most amusing, quaint description of the place
and treatment. The foregoing list does not include his
numerous addresses at the meetings of various medical
societies, even in London, or his celebrated address on

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12 Sir Dominic Corrigan

medical education delivered at the meeting of the
British Medical Association in Dublin in 1866. That
address, and the one on surgery by Dr. Robert William
Smith, were the literary gems of that assembly. Dr.
Stokes was the President, and I had the honour of being
Joint-Secretary with the late Professor Tufmell.

Notwithstanding the immense labour which his vast
practice involved, and his ceaseless diligence in teaching
and writing, Corrigan found time to accomplish a large
amount of public work. It seems almost impossible to
recount it all. He took a deep interest in all educational
questions, and was an active Senator of the Queen's
University from the first, being elected its Vice-Chancellor
in 1871. For twenty-one years he represented it in the
Medical Council, and rarely missed a meeting, despite
the inconvenience, fatigue, and loss its frequent calls to
London involved. He was for many years a member
of the Board of National Education, and most punctual
in attendance at its meetings. All the medical societies
knew him as a regular attendant at their gatherings, and
as a most telling speaker. He excelled in debate — clear
and incisive, and yet very kindly to opponents. His
style was matchless, and his English simple but perfect.

When the question of the introduction of the Vartry
water arose Corrigan was its most ardent and influential
advocate. The part he took in favouring the project
of the introduction of this pure water supply to Dublin
was largely instrumental in carrying that most salutary
measure. His letter to Dr. Gray (afterwards Sir John
Gray), published in the Irish Times of 25th August 1860,
was exhaustive and unanswerable, and aided powerfully
in carrying the day.

It is only those who, like myself, remember Dublin
before the Vartry water supply that can appreciate its
inestimable value. Up to that time Dublin was supplied
by two basins, full of highly contaminated canal water,
and with no sufficient pressure to help in extinguishing

140

Sir Dominic Corrigan 13

fire. I remember well a terrible fire in Westmoreland
Street, where a houseful of people were burned alive, no
water reaching the higher parts of the house. That
tragedy helped not a little in the crisis, and the scheme
was carried — not without sharp opposition — and brought
a marked improvement in public health. Since then we
have had no visitation of cholera, and typhoid fever and
zymotic disease in general has greatly diminished. To
Corrigan's influence, assisted by that of Sir John Gray,
Dublin is largely indebted for this huge measure of
reform.

From an early period of his life — in fact, from the
appearance of his article on aortic disease — honours
poured in upon Corrigan. In 1832 he was elected a
member of the Surgical Society. In 1843 he felt a
desire to have a surgical diploma, and selected the
College of Surgeons of England. On presenting himself
before the Board of Examiners, he was asked, "Are
you the author of the essay on patency of the aortic
valves ? " On replying in the affirmative, he was
presented with the diploma without further question.
In 1847 ne was appointed Honorary Physician in
Ordinary to Queen Victoria in Ireland, a decoration
never before given to a Catholic, which he greatly valued
and held to the hour of his death. In 1849 he was made
an Honorary M.D. of the University of Dublin.

In 1859 Corrigan was elected to the Fellowship of the
College of Physicians of Ireland, and shortly after made
President. To this high office he was re-elected no less
than five times consecutively, an honour quite unpre-
cedented in that ancient institution ; and indeed he
proved the wisdom of his electors, for he struck out
and perfected the plan by which the present noble
building in Kildare Street was brought into existence.
Up to that time the meetings of the College were held
in one of the large rooms of Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital :
a very unsuitable place for such a purpose, and sadly

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14 Sir Dominic Corrigan

lacking the dignity of a college. No doubt it was for
this reason the College was little known, and its diploma
rarely sought. Corrigan proposed that a sufficient sum
to erect a suitable college, in a prominent position,
should be raised in form of debentures amongst the
Fellows, and he commenced by putting down his name
for two thousand pounds. Others quickly followed, and
the needful sum was promptly obtained, the debentures
bearing interest at 5 per cent.

So great and rapid was the popularity of the College
under the new conditions and auspices, that the fees from
candidates and graduates increased to such an extent
as to enable the whole debt to be paid off in a very
few years. The Fellows testified their appreciation of
Corrigan's great achievement by having his portrait —
by Catterson Smith — hung in the examination hall.
He himself bestowed a valuable stained-glass window,
bearing the arms of the College and the Irish harp and
shamrock. Later, by subscription — professional and
public — Foley's noble statue was placed in the College,
in company with those of Corrigan's illustrious colleagues,
Graves, Marsh, and Stokes.

In 1866 Corrigan was created Baronet in recognition
of his professional eminence and services to education.
In 1874 he was elected Corresponding Member of the
Paris Academy of Medicine — an honour only once before
bestowed on an Irishman : namely, the celebrated Richard
Carmichael.

I have before me now a letter from the famous Pro-
fessor Andral, of Paris, to Corrigan (dated August 1841),
congratulating him upon his " power of observation and
deduction from facts." I translate this sentence because,
brief as it is, it epitomizes the very special talent of the
gifted recipient.

Among many high distinctions, we have seen that he
filled the office of Vice-President of the Queen's Univer-
sity, was a member of the Medical Council, and Com-

142

Sir Dominic Corrigan 15

missioner of National Education. He was also President
of the Pathological Society, succeeding Sir Philip Cramp-
ton. On retiring in 1866 from the office of Physician to
the House of Industry Hospitals, he was elected Con-
sulting Physician, and a member of the Board of the
Institution. In 1875 he was elected President of the
Pharmaceutical Society. In a word, he held all the
positions of honour possible for him to acquire.

During the time that Lord Clarendon and Sir William
Somerville were in office, it was well known that Sir
Dominic was their trusted friend and adviser. What
a record of work, so useful, and so well done !

In 1870 Corrigan entered Parliament as Member for
Dublin, in the Liberal interest, and hoping to be of
service to the medical profession. He bid fair for success,
despite his age ; but his health suffered, and his family
and friends were glad when he failed to obtain re-election
four years later. Be it told, however, to his honour, that
his failure was due to his loyalty to the temperance
cause and the Sunday closing movement ; a policy
which raised a storm of opposition against him with a
certain party of vast influence in election matters.

The present is not the time or place to speak of Corri-
gan's personal charm of character. I deal rather with
the grander aspects of the great man. Still, his person-
ality was something never to be forgotten by those who
knew him intimately. He was loved by his patients,
and respected and trusted by his professional brethren.
His great kindness, cheerful, encouraging manner, and
intuitive knowledge of all that came under his observa-
tion were wonderful. He was full also of quiet humour,
such as we see in most great men, especially Irishmen.
May I quote a single instance ? Once, when attending
a lady of rank in fever, when he entered her room, ac-
companied by her anxious husband, he said to the
latter : " She is better." The visit completed, when
they left the patient, the husband asked him how he knew

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T6 Sir Dominic Corrigan

at a glance and without examination that the patient
was better. " I knew it," said Sir Dominic, "by an
infallible symptom — I saw the handle of a looking-glass
peeping from under her pillow ! " He was right. The
lady was better and made an excellent recovery. Ex
uno disce omnes. Corrigan was ever the same — his
greatness never interfered with his observation and
appreciation of the smallest detail.

Corrigan had a very high idea of the respect due to the
profession, and never permitted the smallest slight. For
example : — One bitter winter's day I met him in consulta-
tion in a house in our (Merrion) Square. We saw and
examined the patient, who was in bed upstairs, and then
came down to consult. Having been shown into a comfort-
less, fireless drawing-room, Corrigan said to me : "I won't
consult here," and opened the door into the back drawing-
room, where the family were warming themselves over a
glorious fire. He said at once : " Let us exchange rooms."
The consultation over, we called the family in to hear our
fortunately favourable opinion. ' ' Now," said he, smiling,
" do you think Dr. Cruise and I could have done justice
to the case if we had been left perishing in the other
room ? " All laughed. It needed Corrigan to do this, yet
he was right. The patient's life was at stake ; for his sake
we were entitled to more consideration. He was most
careful never to betray the smallest haste or pressure
of time. No matter how really hurried, he never let
it be seen, and he taught me never to look at my
watch in my consulting room, but to have a clock
always visible at a glance, but not prominent. Not
alone in great things, but in the smallest, Corrigan was
unapproachable.

His idea of the sacredness of knowledge gained through
the profession was as exalted as could be, and he carried
it to a point for which he sometimes suffered blame —
but unjustly. He maintained, and most rightly, that
medical men should never answer inquiries from Insur-

144

Sir Dominic Corrigan 17

ance offices. He would say : " Let the companies find
out all they can with the help of their skilled medical
officers, but never answer their queries, with or without
the consent of the insuring party. What we know
professionally is sacred, and not for sale." This is
absolutely right. His able paper on this subject, read
before the Medical Society of the College of Physicians
of Ireland, will be found in the Medical Press and Circular
of 22nd April 1868.

I have already alluded to Corrigan's early struggles
against the disabilities which marred his progress, owing
to his religion. But his loyalty to the Catholic
Church in which he was born, educated, and believed,
was unswerving. I am sorry space will not allow me
to reproduce here the speech he made at the inaugura-
tion of the newly-built Church of St. Augustine in
May 1869. That church was specially interesting to
him, because it stands upon the site of the house in
Thomas Street where Sir Dominic was born in 1802.
In that address he described, with all the trenchant
power of his eloquence, the baneful influence on Catholics
of the unjust and cruel penal laws which still existed
in his youth, and the glorious emancipation therefrom
which Daniel O'Connell accomplished, happily without
the shedding of one drop of blood.

He brought his fine peroration to a conclusion with the
expression of earnest hope that absolute religious equality
may be established in Ireland, without which there can
never be true nationality, and that everyone, whatever
his belief may be, shall accept for his motto the words,
GOD AND OUR NATIVE LAND.

I heard that speech and can never forget it. During
the latter years of his life, despite his magnificent con-
stitution, Sir Dominic's health failed evidently, mainly
owing to gout, and about a year before his last illness he
had a slight threat of a paralytic seizure. This confined
him for a time to his seaside home at Dalkey, where I

145

1 8 Sir Dominic Corrigan

attended him ; but he recovered sufficiently to resume
his practice, and his mental powers never deteriorated,
even to the very end. However, on the 3oth of December
1879 his left side became paralysed, and he was carried
up to bed, which he never after left alive. Sir John
Banks and I attended him closely, I sleeping in an
adjoining room in his house, in readiness for any emer-
gency.

Surrounded by his devoted loving wife, son, and
daughters, and nursed to perfection by experts, Corrigan
lingered on for over four weeks. During his last illness
he was attended by the Very Rev. Dr. Donnelly, then
Administrator of the parish (now the Most Rev. Bishop
of Canea). With characteristic simplicity and courage he
made his preparation for death, received the last rites of
Holy Church, and patient and calm awaited his hour. He
spoke of it to me with perfect resignation the day before
he died. The end came most peacefully and happily
during the first hours of February 1880. For him truly,
as St. Augustine says, " the Christian's death is only the
dawn of the better life."

The interment took place on 5th February in St.
Andrew's Church, Westland Row, after a procession
which had not been equalled for years in extent or the
rank of those attending. The church was filled by
mourners of every creed, while the solemn services were
conducted by his brother-in-law, the Most Rev. Dr.
Woodlock, Bishop of Ardagh.

The morning following Sir Dominic's death, the
Freeman's Journal gave an eloquent obituary notice of
the great man, from which I extract a paragraph well
worthy of the occasion : " For the people of Ireland at
large he had a character of which, perhaps, he was not
himself altogether conscious. They regarded his career
with peculiar interest, and his success with gratified
pride ; because they saw in him evidence of a Catholic
rising against all opposition to the highest position

146

Sir Dominic Corrigan 19

possible for him to acquire. This feeling was nowise
sectarian, it was rather racial and national — they felt
that intellectual triumph was their noblest vindication
against the contumely which had fallen on them in
consequence of the ignorance enforced upon the nation
by the penal laws. And certainly no man dared vilify
the people who, at such a period, gave such chiefs to the
three learned professions as Bishop Doyle, O'Connell,
and Dominic Corrigan."

By Sir Dominic's death the medical profession at large
lost one of its most conspicuous and distinguished
members, the University of Edinburgh one of its most
illustrious graduates, and the Irish race one of its finest
specimens. Although a thorough Irishman, Sir Dominic
was as much at home in London as in Dublin, and while
a sincere Catholic in faith, he had too much humanity
and breadth of mind to be a bigot. It would be well
indeed for Ireland if all her sons possessed such modera-
tion, sense, and good feeling as he habitually displayed
in dealing uncompromisingly with delicate and difficult
questions.

I must say a few words of Sir Dominic's home life.
It was, as those who, like me, were intimate with the
family, knew, one of ideal happiness. He married
young (in 1829) the daughter of William Woodlock, Esq.,
a wealthy Dublin merchant. There were three sons and
three daughters. The eldest son, John Joseph, was a
distinguished officer and captain in the 3rd Dragoon
Guards. He died in 1866, leaving an only son, who also
died young, the baronetcy then becoming extinct. Sir
Dominic's youngest son died in childhood, but the second,
William, survived his father a year or so. He was a
barrister of distinction. Of the three daughters, the
eldest, Mary, married the late Sir Richard Martin, Bart.,
and died a few years ago. The youngest, Johanna, died
in girlhood ; and the second, Celia, survived her father
only a few months.

147

ANGELO SECCHI, S.J.

(1818-1878)

THE REV. A. L. CORTIE, S.J., F.R.A.S.

AT the fourth conference of the International Union
for Co-operation in Solar Research, held at the solar
observatory of Mount Wilson, near Pasadena, California,
in September 1910, twelve nationalities were represented
by eighty-four delegates, among whom were some of
the most distinguished astronomers and physicists in the
world. Among the resolutions passed by the Union
was one to the effect that the Secchi Memorial Fund
which was being raised in Italy should be devoted to
the erection of a powerful instrument for solar observa-
tions in the land of his birth. Secchi had been dead
thirty-two years, and yet his memory is cherished and
his fame is propagated by those who are most competent
to deliver judgement upon his work in scientific research.
His was a career which, in the words of the obituary
notice printed in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astro-
nomical Society in the year 1879, " had shed lustre on
his country, and had added another to the long list of
names of which the Jesuits are so justly proud."

The enemies of Holy Church have made such un-
warranted use of science as a weapon of attack against
even her most fundamental truths, that an impression
has sometimes been produced among many of her
children that the pursuit of science is damaging and
dangerous to faith. This feeling has been intensified
8 149 I

2 Angela Secchi

by the fact that some leading men of science of modern
times have been utterly devoid of all religion ; while
the contrary fact that other leaders in science — such
as Pasteur, Chevreul, Rontgen, to mention only a few
such names — have been equally remarkable as devoted
children of the Catholic Church, is unaccountably for-
gotten. For a moment's reflection will serve to con-
vince every Catholic mind that, as the Vatican Council
declared, " nulla unquam inter fidem et rationem vera
dissensio esse potest " : there can be no real antagonism
between faith and right reason. To which we may
append as a corollary an exhortation contained in a
letter of our late Holy Father, Pope Leo XIII., to the
members of the Scientific Society of Brussels. He thus
writes : " Of a truth, when the declared enemies of
religion show no weariness, but endeavour ever more
and more to proclaim abroad the opposition between
science and religion, it is opportune that there should
arise on all sides men distinguished for science and
piety, who, heartily attached to the doctrines and teach-
ing of the Church, should apply themselves to prove
that there can never exist any real opposition between
science and religion." We take it that the best mode
of proof is by the leading of a holy and unblemished life,
and by being a pattern of all the virtues, while at the
same time devoted to science. And of this truth the
life of Father Secchi is a striking example ; for his life
is not only the life of one of the leaders of scientific
thought of his day, but that of one who knew how to
unite religion and science — who was at the same time a
great astronomer and a holy priest. His life work, too,
was accomplished in the city which is the centre of
Catholicism, the Eternal City of Rome, and under the
fostering care of its Supreme Pontiff. It is ever so ;
for Holy Church, far from being opposed to the progress
of science, has always been conspicuous for the generous
support she has given to scientific studies, even, as in

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Angela Secchi 3

these later days, in the periods of her greatest poverty.
We may take as one instance the re-establishment and
the enlargement of the modern Vatican Observatory by
our late Holy Father, Pope Leo XIII. Any sketch,
therefore, of the life of Father Secchi would be incomplete
did we look only to a record of his scientific attain-
ments and ignore the priestly and religious aspect of his
character. For it was on the firm foundation of faith
and religion that he built up the edifice of science; it
was from this source that he drew all his motives for
study and research; for his end and object in life was
the advancement of God's greater glory. Very appropri-
ately may be applied to him the aphorism of the dis-
tinguished philosopher Leibnitz : " I have a high esteem
for science, because it gives me the right to demand
silence when I speak of religion." The work of Father
Secchi in the Church was an apostolate of the demonstra-
tion of faith by science.

Angelo Secchi was born on June 29, 1818, at the
town of Reggio in Lombardy, situated between Parma
and Modena. The chief care of his good parents, James-
Anthony Secchi and Louisa Belgieri, was to give their
little son the best education which they could command,
and accordingly at an early age he was sent to the
College of the Society of Jesus which was established in
his native town. Under the fostering care of the good
fathers the boy advanced in piety and in learning. In
his studies he distinguished himself as no mean proficient
in Greek literature. But God was calling him to His
special service, and accordingly, on the completion of his
college course, he entered the novitiate of the Society of
Jesus at the early age of fifteen, and remained there two
years. Thence he passed to Rome to the famous Roman
College of the Society, to add one more illustrious name
to the long role of popes, cardinals, bishops, statesmen,
warriors, and savants whom it is its pride and glory to
have produced. The first course he followed was that

4 Angela Secchi

of higher literature, after the completion of which he
entered upon his philosophical studies, which extended
over a period of three years. Comprised in this course
was one on physics and mathematics ; and so great was
the talent evinced by Secchi in these particular subjects,
that, student as he was, he was appointed to assist the
professor of these matters at the College of Nobles.
After finishing his philosophical studies, he was appointed
in the year 1839 to teach a class of grammar in the
Roman College, but in the following year was trans-
ferred to the professorship of physics and mathematics
at the College of Loretto, where he distinguished himself
by his concise and clear method of teaching. This post
he occupied for four years, when he returned to the
Roman College to commence his theological studies pre-
paratory to the priesthood. He was ordained priest on
September 12, 1847. He remained in Rome, lecturing
at the Roman College, till March 1848, when on account
of the revolutionary troubles which had broken out in
Italy he was compelled, as a member of the Society of
Jesus — which on account of its special work in the educa-
tion of youth ever bears the brunt of the onslaught of
those who would rob the Church of her little ones — to
quit his native land with the other members of his order,
and fly into exile. With several others he came to
England, and was sent to Stonyhurst College, where he
devoted himself for a few months to the study of mathe-
matics. But Stonyhurst may claim the honour of having
initiated the future great astronomer into the study of
the heavens. At that time the observatory, which had
been founded in the year 1838, was under the director-
ship of Father Weld. Besides being a meteorological
station, the astronomical outfit comprised a 4-inch equa-
torial telescope, which is now used as a finder to the
15-inch equatorial which stands in its present state as
a memorial to another distinguished Jesuit astronomer,
the late Father Perry. This small telescope was then

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Angela Secchi 5

housed in a circular chamber, surmounted by a cylindri-
cal revolving roof, which rises above the central portion
of the meteorological observatory. This was the instru-
ment which Secchi first used, and there was excited in
him that enthusiastic devotion to astronomical studies
which was the foundation of his subsequent brilliant
career. He did not remain long in England, for on
October 24, 1848, with twenty-one of his companions in
misfortune, he sailed from Liverpool, arriving at New
York on November 19. Thence he proceeded to the
Georgetown University of the Society of Jesus at Wash-
ington, where, while teaching the elements of natural
science, he found time to pursue his astronomical studies.
The university observatory in which he worked was
then directed by Father Curley.

Father Sestini, the assistant of the Roman College
observatory, who had also been expelled from Rome
at the same time as Secchi, had already arrived at
Georgetown, and the two Italian fathers were more-
over expecting the arrival of Father De Vico, astro-
nomer and musician, the director of the Roman College
observatory. He, however, died in London in 1849,
at the early age of forty-three, his death being hastened
by the sufferings he had undergone in the revolution-
ary troubles. Peace having been restored in the same
year, Father Secchi was recalled to Rome by the General
of the Society of Jesus to succeed Father De Vico in
the directorship of the observatory. The observatory
had not lacked distinguished directors in its past
history ; among them Father Clavius, surnamed the
Euclid of his age, to whom is due the revision of the
calendar which is still in use in all civilized countries,
and which bears the name of Pope Gregory XIII., under
whose auspices it was undertaken. Nor can we pass
over in silence the name of the famous Father Boscovitch,
astronomer, philosopher, and poet, whose theories on
the constitution of matter received in later days the

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6 Angela Secchi

support of an eminent English man of science, the late
Lord Kelvin. Among the works accomplished by this
eminent man we may mention the geodetic measure-
ment of an arc of nearly two degrees on the Appian
Road between Rome and Rimini.

Secchi left Georgetown on September 21, and came to
England, visiting the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, and
thence passed on to Paris, re-establishing the broken com-
munications between the observatories. On his assum-
ing the direction of the observatory of the Roman College
in 1849, it commenced a new era of prosperity. The old
buildings had for a long time proved inadequate to the
needs of modern scientific research, and Secchi deter-
mined to commence by rebuilding the observatory and
making it worthy of the Eternal City and of the Roman
College. As early as 1750 his predecessor in office,
Boscovitch, had conceived the design of erecting the
observatory on the top of one of the massive piers which
support the dome of the Church of Saint Ignatius ; but
the suppression of the Society of Jesus, and the resulting
scattering of its members, had prevented the accomplish-
ment of the design. This design was resuscitated by
Secchi, and, aided by the generous contributions of the
Holy Father, Pope Pius IX., and of the General of the
Society, Father Roothaan, a stately structure was in due
course raised above the church dedicated to the founder
of the Society of Jesus, in the position selected a century
before by Boscovitch. The new observatory was formally
opened in 1852, and was speedily equipped for astro-
nomical work by the acquisition of a fine refractor of
9 inches aperture made by Merz of Munich, a large
meridian circle by Ertel, and an excellent sidereal clock
by Dent. The munificence of the Pope also enabled
Secchi to establish in the same place a very complete
magnetical observatory. With regard to meteorology,
besides the instruments of ordinary type, Secchi invented
his celebrated meteorograph, an instrument by which

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Angela Secchi 7

automatic registrations are made at the same times, and
at short intervals of time, of the barometer, the ther-
mometer, the direction and velocity of the wind, and
the rainfall. One of these instruments was subsequently
exhibited at the Paris Exhibition in 1867, and was
esteemed so highly that the Emperor Napoleon III.
conferred upon Secchi the decoration of the Legion of
Honour, and the Emperor of Brazil gave him the Grand
Cordon of the Order of the Rose. But we are anticipating
the chronological course of events, for in the very same
year that the new observatory was opened, on the 2nd of
February, Father Secchi took his final vows, and so
bound himself to the life-long service of Almighty God in
the Society of Jesus, to promote by every means in his
power His greater glory. This was the motive which
spurred him on in his astronomical studies, and was the
very root of his enthusiasm and devotion to research.
Of this we may judge by an extract from his own writings :
" To whisper to oneself how magnificent it is to reveal
the works of the Creator : this is a stimulus which lasts
when all other motives fail. It raises the human intellect
above the dryness of mere figures, and produces from
such labours a work which is lofty — nay, divine. He who ,
penetrated with such ideas, contemplates the heavens,
has not in his heart the mere oppression of a cold admira-
tion, in considering the depths of space filled with bodies
the greater number of which are inaccessible to the most
powerful means which Providence has put at the dis-
position of man, and which, by their immense distances
and their prodigious quantity, appear to him but as ill-
defined masses of confused light. On the contrary, his
heart is filled with a sweet sentiment of joy in thinking
of these innumerable worlds, among which each star is
a beneficent sun, a minister of God's goodness, spreading
life and benefits on other innumerable beings, loaded
with the benedictions of the hand of the Most High ;
thinking too of that privileged order of intelligent beings

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8 Angela Secchi

to which he himself belongs, and who, from the depths
of the heavens, sing a hymn of praise to their Creator."
However one might disagree with the implication con-
tained in the above passage, as to the habitability of
other worlds besides our own earth, and however modified
the scientific conclusions of Secchi with regard to the
" ill-defined masses of confused light " may have become
under the space-penetrating power of modern giant
telescopes, yet all can but admire the sublimity of his
ideals, and how his heart and mind recognized his
Creator in the works of His omnipotence. As a corollary
to these words of Secchi, let me quote the dictum of a
modern leader of scientific thought in England, the late
Lord Kelvin : "If you think strongly enough you will
be forced by science to believe in God, which is the
foundation of all religion." How incomparably loftier
are such thoughts and ideals than those of materialistic
rationalists, whose science is the be-all and end-all of
their existence ! Let us hear one of the protagonists of
this school. The late Professor Tyndall thus addressed
an audience at New York : " This then is the cue of
the whole matter as regards science. It must be culti-
vated for its own sake, for the pure love of truth rather
than for the applause or profit that it brings." A worthy
ideal, but lacking the one element of sublimity which
the seeking of God in His creatures entails. And the
end ? To again quote Professor Tyndall : " Like the
streaks of the morning cloud, to melt away into the
infinite azure of the past."

There are two main divisions or departments in
astronomical science: the older astronomy, or gravita-
tional astronomy as it is sometimes called, which deals
with the positions, the motions, the masses, and the
distances of the heavenly bodies ; and a newer astro-
nomy, which saw its inception with the application of
the telescope to the study of the heavens at the beginning
of the seventeenth century, and which is concerned

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Angela Secchi 9

mainly with the physical appearances and constitution
of the denizens of the skies. It was to this newer
branch of the science, or to astrophysics, that Secchi
mainly turned his attention, and it so happened that
the period of his directorship of the Roman College
observatory coincided with the introduction of a new
and powerful engine of research into the domain of the
science. This was the spectroscope, an instrument by
which the astronomer is enabled to tell the materials to
be found in the sun and the stars by an analysis of their
light, thus belying the dictum of Auguste Comte, the
father of Positivism, who had declared that astronomers
might be able to weigh and measure the distances of
the heavenly bodies, but that they would never be able
to find out what they were made of. The principle of
spectrum analysis adumbrated by many men of science,
among them by Kepler and Newton, and taught in his
lectures by Stokes at Cambridge, was enunciated in
1859 by two German philosophers, Kirchhoff and Bunsen.
Secchi was quick to see the immense bearings of the new
science on astronomical research, and shares with our
own Sir William Huggins the glory of being one of the
pioneers of astronomical spectroscopy. Solar and stellar
physics was his speciality; in these he was a master,
although, as the long list of his published papers testifies,
he did not by any means neglect other branches of the
science, as is seen by his observations of Mars and Saturn,
his rediscovery of Biela's comet on September 6, 1852, his
long and patient series of measurements of double stars
found in the catalogues of Herschel and Struve, and his
detailed descriptions of no less than thirty-one nebulae.
In fact, it is hardly possible to turn to the index of any
astronomical book without finding a reference to Secchi.
He was one of that small band of astronomers who
laid the very foundations of our present knowledge of
solar physics, and laid them well. There was no species
of solar phenomenon of which Secchi had not made a

io Angela Secchi

profound study. He executed a long series of observa-
tions of sun-spots, their forms, their types, their proper
movements, their life-histories, their cyclic changes in
number, position, and size. With his spectroscope, in
the pellucid Italian sky, he studied the form and extent
of the hydrogen atmosphere which surrounds the sun,
and the mighty prominences of hydrogen gas that
emanate from it. He catalogued their forms, their
velocities, as also the constituents of the prominences
which contain the heavier metallic vapours. The general
spectrum of the solar surface he also studied, and he
issued a map of the dark lines indicating the presence of
the metallic vapours and the gases that overlie the sun's
shining surface or photosphere. He headed two expedi-
tions for the observation of the sun's corona during total
solar eclipses. In 1860 he went to Spain for the observa-
tion of the total eclipse of July 18. Working in con-
junction with Senor Aquilar of Madrid, he obtained four
photographs of the corona during the total phase. These,
when compared with photographs of Mr. Warren de la
Rue taken at another station, set at rest the controversy
then rife as to whether the corona was a true solar
appendage or was only an optical delusion. Ten years
later he observed yet another total solar eclipse at
Augusta in Sicily on December 20, 1870.

But Secchi's greatest and most enduring work was
the division of stellar spectra into four groups or classes.
Of necessity modern researches have considerably aug-
mented Secchi's types, and various rearrangements have
been suggested, but even then they form a first and ready
term of reference for the greatest number of stars in
the heavens. For the purposes of this classification he
observed the spectra of no less than 4000 stars. The
four great groups are as follows : — Type i, in which
the lines of hydrogen are very marked, as in Sirius,
Vega, Altair, Regulus, and Rigel. To this class were
assigned about half the stars in the heavens. Type 2,

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Angelo Secchi 1 1

in which the stars were characterised by numerous fine
dark lines in their spectra, as in the case of our own
Sun, and in Pollux, Arcturus, Aldebaran, Procyon, and
a Ursae Majoris. In the spectra of stars of Type 3 is a
system of nebulous bands, which are more defined
towards the violet end of the spectrum. Characteristic
of this class is the star a Herculis. Father Sidgreaves
has in recent years investigated the spectra of stars, at
Stonyhurst, which show a gradual change of spectrum
between Secchi's Type 2 and Type 3. Professor Fowler
has more recently shown that the series of bands in the
spectra of stars of this Type 3 are due to the chemical
compound titanium oxide. The long-period variable
star Mira Ceti belongs to this class. In Type 4 also a
band spectrum is in evidence, but the bands in this case
are more definitely defined on their red sides. Many
small deep red stars belong to this category. Secchi
was the first astronomer to point out the characteristics
of these various types of stars, which presumably are
arranged in a descending scale of temperature. On this
subject he published numerous catalogues and lists of
star spectra, the result of many laborious observations.
Two of his best-known memoirs dealing with stellar
spectra are Catalogo delle stelle di cui si & determinate
lo spettro luminoso, published at Paris in 1867, and
Sugli spettri Prismatici delle Stelle Fisse, published at
Rome in 1868. Among his regular publications are the
Memoria dell' Observatorio, supplemented by the Bulletino
meteorologico dell' Observatorio del Collegia Romano.

In 1854 Secchi was commissioned by the Papal
Government to execute the measurement of a geodetic
base-line, extending over an arc of two degrees, between
Rome and Rimini along the Appian Way, repeating
with greater accuracy the measurements made by
Boscovitch in 1751. He was also employed by the
Papal Government to design and superintend the erec-
tion of the lighthouses on the coasts of the States of the

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12 Angela Secchi

Church, and even the schemes for the water supply of
several Roman towns were committed to his skill and
judgement. In 1862 he represented his Government in
Paris at the International Commission on the Metric
System. How he found time to undertake all these
labours is difficult to surmise, for he was actively engaged
in the direction of his observatory and in its routine
work, and, moreover, was a professor of astronomy at
the famous Roman College. He delivered also many
public lectures on his favourite science, the most note-
worthy being that on the Sun, given in Rome during
the time of the sessions of the Vatican Council, which
was attended by more than three hundred of the fathers
of the Council. His memoirs and communications to
learned societies number upwards of two hundred,
and of these thirty-seven were presented to our own
Royal Astronomical Society. Among his larger pub-
lished works may be mentioned : — (i) // Quadro fisico del
Sistema Solare. (2) L'unitd delle forze fisiche, a work
which has been translated into French and German,
and has gone through two Italian editions. (3) Le Soleil,
a popular work embodying his own labours on solar
physics, and covering the whole ground of the subject
and its cognate branches then known. It reached its
second French edition in 1875, and was translated into
German. It is a classic on the subject of which it
treats. (4) Le Stelle, a valuable contribution to a series
of popular science volumes, published at Milan in 1878.
(5) Lezioni di Fisica terrestre, and (6) Lezioni di Fisica
pel Giovanni, both for the young.

The merits of Secchi's scientific work were soon
recognized by the leading academies of the world. It
would be useless to rehearse all his scientific honours.
We may note, however, that he was elected a foreign
member of our own Royal Society in 1856, and an
associate of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1853.
He was also a member of the French Academy of Sciences,

1 60

Angela Secchi 13

and of the Imperial Academy of St. Petersburg. In his
native land he was one of the Societa Italiana de XL.,
and was for some years President of the Accademia dei
Nuovi Lincei.

As we have already seen, the beginnings of Secchi's
scientific career were conditioned by the revolutionary
movement of 1848, which drove him to Stonyhurst. Its
end was to be saddened by the events which led up to
the entrance of the Italian troops into Rome on Septem-
ber 20, 1870, since which time the temporal power of
the Popes has been in abeyance, and the Vicar of Jesus
Christ on earth has become the Prisoner of the Vatican.
But Secchi was not destined to share in the decree of
proscription which again drove his religious brethren
of the Society of Jesus into exile. The observatory
of the Roman College had a world-wide reputation,
and Secchi was one of the more illustrious Italian
men of science of the day, if not the most illustrious..
Accordingly, arrangements were made by special Acts
of Parliament to retain him in the post which he occupied
with so much distinction. He and his assistants were
exempt from the decrees of banishment. But his vital
powers were slowly ebbing, for the malady which finally
killed him was of long duration, and so in the last years
of his life he was compelled to abandon active observa-
tions, and devoted himself to study, though always
directing and controlling the various researches which
were undertaken at the observatory by his devoted
assistants, chief among whom was Padre Ferrari. In
the second week of January 1878 he was compelled to
take to his bed, and, though aided by the leading surgeons
of the University, science was not able to relieve him.
But from this time until his death he seemed to have
lost all thought except for the things of God, and his
piety, humility, resignation, and patience under suffer-
ing edified all who came into contact with him. On
January 23 he asked to receive Holy Viaticum, and as

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14 Angela Secchi

a public profession of his faith he wished to have the
Blessed Sacrament carried with all possible ceremony
from the parish church. But this was deemed inadvis-
able, and he received the last rites of the Church privately
on the following day. One of the thoughts that con-
soled him most on his deathbed was that of having
spent his life for the cause of religion and Holy Church.
" Oh," he exclaimed to one who visited him in his sick-
ness, " if you only knew what comfort I feel in dying,
after having spent my life in the service of the Church ! "

A religious who is bound by his vow of poverty
has no personal property to leave behind him. But
it may so happen that he is the legal representative
of his order with regard to property that is held in
common. Such was the case with Father Secchi with
regard to the Roman College observatory, which had
been rebuilt and equipped with modern instruments at
the expense of the General and Fathers of the Society of
Jesus. Accordingly, the observatory was willed by him
to his assistant, Father Ferrari. After his death, how-
ever, the Italian Government, disregarding these dis-
positions in his will, annexed the observatory and
instruments as part of the confiscated goods of the
Jesuits. The director who was appointed to succeed
Secchi, though a layman, had been a pupil of Secchi's,
and Pietro Tacchini carried on the solar work of the
institution with great distinction until the time of his
death. More recently Pope Leo XIII. rebuilt and re-
furnished the old observatory in the Vatican gardens,
the present director of which is a Jesuit father, Father
Hagen, who was summoned from Georgetown to Wash-
ington to take charge of the Papal Institution.

But to return to the death-bed of Secchi. The Roman
College, as is well known, was honoured by the holy life
and death of a saint in the calendar of Holy Church
who is the special patron of youth, St. Aloysius Gonzaga.
To this saint Secchi had a great devotion. He there-

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Angela Secchi 15

fore begged that his Cross of the Legion of Honour might,
after his death, be hung as a votive offering on the tomb
of the saint, playfully remarking that he had knighted
St. Aloysius. The insignia of the Order of the Rose of
Brazil he wished to be similarly offered to the holy
founder of the Society of Jesus, St. Ignatius of Loyola,
He also ardently desired to receive a special blessing
from the Holy Father, Pope Pius IX., and his lay-brother
assistant, Brother Marchetti, was sent to the Vatican to
beg the favour of the Supreme Pontiff. " Willingly do
I grant it," said the Pope ; adding, " Father Secchi has
always known how to unite science with religious virtue,
but the two virtues which shone most in him were
humility and obedience. We know how often he was
urged to accept honours and employments from the
Italian Government, but he would never accept them.
... He always came to us for counsel and advice, and
never took a step without first hearing what was our
opinion. Truly he has been an excellent religious."
Such was the eulogium of the Vicar of Jesus Christ upon
earth with regard to this humble son of St. Ignatius
and distinguished astronomer.

One more weary month the sick man lingered, expiring
on February 26, 1878, at the age of fifty-nine years and
three months, his last words being an act of thanksgiving
to God for the great favour of dying in the bosom of the
Church, a member of the Society of Jesus, and in the
Roman College, sanctified by the death of St. Aloysius.
He had lived forty-four years of his life as a Jesuit.
"Those who instruct others unto justice shall shine as
stars for all eternity." The life of Father Secchi is an
instruction that makes for justice or holiness by its bright
example of humility and obedience, and by its testimony,
if testimony were needed, to the truth that science is
not the monopoly of materialism and rationalism, but
is compatible with deep faith in, and with holiness of
living according to, the truths of revealed religion. His

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1 6 Angela Secchi

obsequies were celebrated in the Church of St. Ignatius,
the body resting in front of the altar between the four
columns which support the dome, while the observatory,
the scene of his labours, rose as a fitting monument
above the poor coffin of the humble religious. In front
of the altar — beneath the observatory : altar and
observatory sum up the life of Padre Angelo Secchi.

Father Secchi's native town of Reggio in Lombardy
has honoured the memory of her distinguished citizen
by a tablet in the house in which he was born, by a bust
in marble in the museum of the Storia Patria, and by
inscribing his name among the illustrious sons of the
province.

The resolution passed by the members of the Inter-
national Union for Co-operation in Solar Research,
assembled at Mount Wilson Observatory, California,
in 1910, and including delegates from Austria, Canada,
France, Germany, Great Britain, Holland, Italy, Russia,
Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States of
America, representing the leading astronomical and
physical societies and academies of the world, was thus
worded : " The Committee expresses the hope that the
Secchi Memorial Fund, now being raised in Italy, may
be devoted to a tower telescope with spectroheliograph."

164

JOHANN GREGOR MENDEL

(1822-1884)

THE REV. G. A. ELRINGTON, O.P., D.Sc., F.L.S.,

Professor of Biology in the Collegia "Angelica?* Rome.

How many are there who, reading or hearing about
" heredity," or " Mendelism," associate these ideas with
the name of the Augustinian friar, Gregor Mendel ? How
many realize that one of the most brilliant and practical
discoveries in the history of modern biology is the outcome
of some years of careful experiment and patient obser-
vation carried out in a monastery garden in Moravia ?

If science has a romantic side, surely we have all the
elements of romance in the thought of this hitherto little-
known friar, a true lover of God and of nature, tending
his flowers during the leisure moments of the busy round
of a friar's daily life, and meditating the while upon that
most elusive of all problems of nature, heredity.

But what, let us inquire, is Mendelism ? who was
Mendel ? and what was the nature of his work ?

Mendelism may be briefly described as an experimental
method of investigating the laws of heredity, conducted
on lines established by the Augustinian friar, Gregor
Mendel, between the years 1853 and 1870. The term
Mendelism is of recent origin, for Mendel's work remained
for some thirty years practically unknown and neglected,
until at the beginning of the present century it was
brought to light on the Continent by certain biologists
who were engaged on observations similar to those under-
taken by Mendel. To-day, Mendelism may be considered
a distinct branch of biological science, such being the
importance of the results obtained by the application of
Mendel's discoveries.

9 165 I

2 Johann Gregor Mendel

Johann Gregor Mendel, to give him his full name, was
born in humble circumstances, of Catholic parents, at
Heinzendorf in Austrian Silesia, on July 22, 1822. His
father, we are told, was a small farmer or peasant pro-
prietor holding his land on tenure by doing agricultural
labour for the lord of the place.

In the religious atmosphere which so frequently sur-
rounds homes of this description, and from the early
instruction in the truths of the Christian religion received
from his parents, the young Johann imbibed those
principles of earnest piety and unfailing industry for
which he was distinguished throughout his strenuous
life. Poor though his parents were, they made great
sacrifices to provide their son with as good an educa-
tion as was at that time available. Mendel's maternal
uncle, Anton Schwirtlich, had for some years carried
on a small private school in the village of Heinzendorf,
there being no Government school until after the
death of Schwirtlich.

Mendel was first sent to his uncle's school, and showed
so much ability that it was thought worth while to send
him, when only eleven years of age, to another school, at
Leipnik. He himself seems to have asked to be allowed to
study, his ambition having been stirred up by two older
boys who went to the same school, and whose acquaint-
ance Mendel had made. At this school he was again
noticed for his intelligence and diligence, so that he was
soon transferred to the high school and gymnasium at
Troppau, where he remained until he had taken the
degree known as Licentiate in Humanities. On the
completion of his studies at Troppau he spent a year in
further study at Olmiitz. Being now about the age of
twenty-one, the serious question of his future career had
to be decided. With the degree gained at Troppau, and
the recommendations of his teachers, Johann Mendel
could without difficulty have entered upon an academic
career in the Government schools ; but his thoughts and

1 66

Johann Gregor Mendel 3

ambitions were directed rather towards the religious life.
One of his teachers at Troppau was an Augustinian, and
hence it was natural that Mendel should choose for his
future home the well-known and influential Augustinian
monastery at Briinn. Here he would find the solitude
and absence of distraction so congenial to his studious
temperament.

Picturesquely situated at the confluence of the rivers
Schwarza and Zwttawa, near the castle of Spielberg, and
surrounded by extensive woods, the Konigskloster, as
it came to be known later, was founded as far back as
the year 1353 by two members of the noble family of
Margraves of Moravia, Joannis and Jucundus by name,
and was accounted one of the most celebrated in the
Augustinian order.

Many privileges were conferred upon the monastery
by various popes, and its prior or prelate enjoyed the
rank and dignities of a mitred abbot. These privileges
were, however, rather the rewards than the causes of
renown, for the Augustinians of Briinn for many genera-
tions were known for their love of religious observance
and the study of letters, and several of the brethren were
engaged in more recent times in teaching in the schools
of the country, or occupied other official posts, occasion-
ally even being found among the ranks of the legislators.

The monastery to which Johann Mendel sought ad-
mission in the year 1843 was indeed no hive of drones.
The talents and suitable dispositions of the youthful
postulant being already known through his teachers, he
was received without delay and given the habit of the
order, taking at the same time, according to the usual
custom, the religious name of Gregor.

After a year spent in the noviciate in the exercise of
the duties of the religious life, Gregor took the vows
which were to make him a fully professed member of the
Augustinian order, and in due course commenced the
study of philosophy and theology in preparation for the

4 Johann Gregor Mendel

priesthood. During this period, which lasted some eight
years, his taste for natural history and keen faculty of
observation began to develop. He spent much of his
leisure in the monastery garden cultivating various
species of plants and following closely every phase of
their growth, laying then the foundations of those series
of experiments undertaken in later years which have made
his name famous in the annals of biology.

The great question of the origin of varieties and species
in plants, concerning which so much controversy was soon
to arise, seems to have already attracted Mendel's
attention.

" From the time of noviciate/' writes Professor Bate-
son, " he began experimental work, introducing various
plants into the garden and watching their behaviour
under treatment. He was fond of showing these cultures
to his friends. Dr von Niessl relates how on one occasion
he was taken to see Ficaria calthcefolia and Ficaria
ranunculoides (two forms now regarded as varieties of
Ranunculus Ficaria) which had for some years been
cultivated side by side without manifesting any notice-
able change. Mendel jokingly said : ' This much I do see,
that nature cannot get on further with species-making
in this way. There must be something more behind.' '

The scientific bent of young Mendel's mind did not
escape the notice of his superiors, who required capable
teachers for the many educational establishments under
their direction. After his ordination to the priesthood,
Mendel was sent, in 1851, to the university at Vienna
to study mathematics, physics, and natural science.
Here he remained till 1853, and during his stay published
a couple of short scientific papers. On leaving the uni-
versity, Mendel returned to the monastery at Briinn,
and was immediately appointed to teach physics in the
college, or " Realschule," in this city, a post he occupied
until 1868, in which year he was elected by the brethren
to be their prior.

168

Johann Gregor Mendel 5

As a teacher of science he was specially distinguished
for his power of creating enthusiasm for such knowledge
among his students, to whom he was devoted. During
these happy years of his life Mendel carried out his cele-
brated experiments of crossing different varieties of edible
peas and other plants, to which we shall refer presently.

At this period various opinions were beginning to be
discussed concerning the nature and origin of species,
and their susceptibility to change, opinions which later
took a definite form in the writings of Charles Darwin.
While at the university, Mendel's attention was drawn
to these opinions ; but he was not of the temperament
which catches eagerly at the latest scientific hypothesis
merely because it affords a plausible explanation of
nature's mysteries, and, though acquainted with Dar-
win's theory, he did not share his opinions. Mendel was
none the less interested in the problems which Darwin
set about to solve, but the methods adopted by the
talented friar were completely different. Darwin ob-
served and collected a multitude of facts, to explain
which he propounded an ingenious theory. Mendel
went to work to experiment on a large scale, and drew
conclusions which were the results and the expression
of observations recorded with mathematical precision.
These conclusions have again and again been verified,
and the method introduced by Mendel has been extended
over a large field.

Twelve years elapsed before Mendel made known the
results of his experiments. In 1865 he read a paper
before the Natural History Society of Briinn entitled
" Experiments in Plant Hybridization." This was
published in the following year. In 1869 there followed
a similar paper dealing with a hybrid Hieracium.

Mendel's scientific investigations were not confined
to plants : he undertook also a detailed study of the
effects of crossing different races of bees, with the view
of ascertaining the mode in which the special character-

tfg

6 Johann Gregor Mendel

istics of the several races were inherited. Of these ex-
periments Professor Bateson tells us that " he had fifty
hives under observation. He collected queens of all
attainable races — European, Egyptian, and American,
— and effected numerous crosses between these races,
though it is known he had many failures. Attempts
were made to induce queens to mate in his room, which
he netted in with gauze for the purpose ; but it was too
small or too dark, and these efforts were unsuccessful."

Unfortunately, no trace of the notes which Mendel
made of these important experiments has yet come to
light, and it is feared that, during the period of mental
depression which overtook him before his death, he may
have destroyed them.

In addition to natural history, Mendel was also much
interested in the science of meteorology, and devoted
considerable time to the observation of sun-spots, and
appears to have held the opinion, now accepted by many,
that there is a certain connection between the character
of the spots on the sun and the condition of the weather.

With his elevation to the prelature of the monastery
in 1868, a new and less happy epoch in Mendel's career
commenced. In a letter to his friend Nageli, written
after his election, Mendel expressed the hope that he
might still find some time to continue his experiments
on plant hybridization ; but this hope was not destined
to be realized. The government of the monastery
and other affairs henceforth absorbed his whole atten-
tion, leaving him no leisure for his favourite scientific
occupations.

Beyond filling the post of president of the Natural
History Society of Briinn for a year, his scientific career
was closed. Doubtless the Konigskloster gained by
having such an able prelate, but one cannot but regret
the loss which science sustained by the untimely end of
a career which promised so much, and which, considering
its brief span, has borne such unexpected fruit.

170

Johann Gregor Mendel 7

Mendel's business capacity and genius for organization
found scope beyond the confines of the monastery.
Among other things, he established a fire brigade in
his native village of Heinzendorf. In recent years a new
fire-station, bearing on its walls a commemorative tablet,
has been erected by the inhabitants of the town as a
tribute to his memory. For some time Mendel was also
chairman of the Briinn branch of the Moravian Loan Bank.

But clouds were gathering on the political horizon,
and soon a storm was to burst over the monastic estab-
lishments of the country. The persecution of the Church
and of the religious orders, which at this time was rife
in Germany, extended to Moravia. Heavy and vexatious
taxes were imposed upon the monasteries, and the
venerable Konigskloster, which had rendered such
valuable services, was not excepted.

Mendel, however, was not one to yield easily to such
injustice, the motive of which was only too apparent.
He held out stubbornly against the taxation, refusing
to be influenced by the example of other monasteries
which deemed it more prudent to yield to the pressure
put on them. Strenuous efforts were made to bend
Mendel's inflexible will ; influential persons visited him,
endeavouring, by advantageous offers, to induce him to
yield, but it was of no avail. Finally, in 1872, the mon-
astery and its property were sequestrated and converted
to municipal uses. It has since become the Landhaus
of the city, and the gardens a public park.

Thus once more history has to record how the hand of
the spoiler has destroyed an institution in which piety and
learning flourished to the welfare of the world in general.
Little does the despoiler care for the interests of the
community, can he but vent his wrath upon those whose
whole offence lies in their devotion to the worship of
God and the good of their neighbours. But yet in the
long run the people are the losers thereby, not the
religious.

171

8 Johann Gregor Mendel

To leave thus the ancient cloister and garden in which
he had so much interest was indeed a sore trial to Mendel ;
this, together with the constant conflict with the authori-
ties and the task of reorganizing his community else-
where, began to react upon his health, and cast a sombre
shadow over his naturally joyous temperament. During
the last years of his life he suffered much from Bright's
disease, to the ravages of which he eventually succumbed
on January 6, 1884.

Mendel's claim to scientific celebrity rests upon his
discovery of definite laws and sequences which occur in
the distribution of the characters exhibited by the off-
spring of crosses between different varieties of a given
species of plants.

The application of Mendel's principles on a wider scale
has in recent years thrown much light upon the important
but complex problem of heredity.

Before Mendel's time it was well known to plant
hybridists that similar types of hybrids constantly re-
appeared when similar crosses were made, but the reason
of this entirely escaped their observation. To quote
Mendel's own words : " Those who survey the work done
in this department will arrive at the conviction that
among all the numerous experiments made, not one has
been carried out to such an extent and in such a way
as to make it possible to determine the number of
different forms under which the offspring of hybrids
appear, or to arrange these forms with certainty accord-
ing to their separate generations, or definitely to ascer-
tain their statistical relations/'

Mendel accordingly undertook a long series of experi-
ments on lines calculated to furnish these necessary
conditions of success. He chose certain well-defined
and constant varieties of the edible pea (Pisum sativum),
grouping them in pairs according to their distinctive
characters. Thus some varieties of pea are very tall,

172

Johann Gregor Mendel 9

attaining a height of six feet or more ; others are dwarfs
of about eighteen inches to two feet in height. These
would make a pair. Other varieties have round smooth
seeds, or angular wrinkled seeds, which again constitute
a pair of contrasting varieties. . . . One member of a
pair would then be fertilized with pollen taken from the
other : A, for instance, being fertilized by B, and B by A.*

Precautions were first of all taken to remove the
stamens from the flowers destined to be fertilized with
foreign pollen, because in the pea both stamens and
ovaries are found together, and hence self-fertilization
takes place.

The results obtained by cross-fertilization between
the variety with the round smooth seed and that with
the angular and wrinkled seeds were as follows : —

The first crop of seeds obtained were all round and
smooth. These were sown the following year, and the
flowers of the plants which grew from the seeds were
allowed to fertilize themselves and run to seed.

The seed was then carefully collected and examined,
when it was found that they were not all alike, some
being round and smooth, others angular and wrinkled ;
the proportion of the former to the latter being roughly
3 : i. The exact ratio was 2*96 : i.

Thus the type which remained in abeyance in the
first family or generation of seeds reappeared in the
second generation.

* Note. — The process of fertilization in flowering plants, upon which
depends the formation of seeds, and ultimately of a fresh generation of
plants, is effected in the following manner. Two kinds of reproduc-
tive cells concur in the process, viz. pollen grains and egg cells. The
former are contained in receptacles borne at the end of a filament, the
stamen ; the latter are formed in ovaries. In some plants the stamens
and ovaries are borne by one and the same flower ; in others, either
on different flowers of the same plant, or on different plants. ... In
the pea, for instance, each flower bears both stamens and ovaries.
Fertilization consists in the union of a generative cell derived from the
pollen grain with the egg-cell formed within in the ovary. When this
is carried out between stamens and ovaries of the same flower, the
flower is said to be self-fertilized ; if between distinct flowers, the process
is known as cross-fertilization.

173

io Johann Gregor Mendel

The two varieties of seeds were kept carefully apart
and sown in the following year, when Mendel observed
that the plants grown from the angular seeds produced
only seeds of the same variety. The round seeds behaved
otherwise. From some, plants were obtained on which
only round seeds were formed ; from others, a mixture of
round and angular seeds, in the proportion of three
round seeds to one angular, was obtained.

Let us represent this by a diagram.

Round. A x B Angular.

First family (F^ A self-fertilized
(F2) A A A B mixed family

The round variety A exercises a kind of ascendancy
or dominance over the angular variety B, so that the
first hybrid generation (Fj) produce round seeds.
Mendel called the character which appeared in the
first generation or family the " dominant " character,
and recessive that which did not appear. Although
the seeds which showed the dominant character in the
second family were externally all alike, yet their internal
constitution differed. One-third bred true, and pro-
duced round seeds ; two-thirds produced both round and
angular seeds. The former are therefore known as " pure
dominants," the latter as " impure dominants."

Another important point to notice is that the dominant
and recessive characters, which are combined in the first
generation, become dissociated or segregated in subse-
quent generations. This principle of segregation is of
greater importance than the principle of dominance,
since it manifests itself with greater regularity than the
latter, as recent investigations have shown.

Mendel drew from his experiments the conclusion
that the germ-cells of the hybrid peas were of different

174

Johann Gregor Mendel 1 1

kinds, some of which bear one, others another character,
there being no complete blending of both characters in
one germ-cell. It is thus that he explained how the
characters which are associated in the hybrid afterwards
become separated. Hence it follows that if the germ-
cells formed by any given individual are all of one
kind, this individual can only transmit this particular
character, however mixed its ancestry may have been.
So it comes about that the angular seeds B, which are
the offspring of the hybrid plant A of the first genera-
tion, only produce angular seeds.

Mendel's conclusion was certainly substantiated by
the behaviour of the hybrid varieties of peas which he
cultivated. In all his experiments he found that certain
characters predominated over others, and that a separa-
tion of characters temporarily associated in the hybrid
occurs in subsequent generations. He found, moreover,
that the combination and segregation of characters re-
curred with almost mathematical precision.

Many curious and interesting experiments on Men-
delian lines might be cited, and the remarkable results
to which they have led might be detailed. One, at least,
may be given without running the risk of overloading
this paper with details, and that is the case of the so-
called Blue Andalusian fowls, which had for so long
baffled the breeders and been their despair.

Every effort to secure anything like a pure strain — that
is, a strain which might be relied upon to breed true —
was made, and every effort failed. Even when two
perfect representatives of the breed were selected as
parents the results were almost uniformly the produc-
tion of what are called "wasters" — that is, offspring
which, not reproducing the parental characteristics,
were valueless from the point of view of the breeder.
Some of these "wasters" were pure black, some were
white with black splashes. It must not be supposed
that these " wasters " were the sole product of the

175

12 Johann Gregor Mendel

breeding. On the average the results of the breeding
of a pen of Blue Andalusians has been the produc-
tion of twenty-five per cent, each of the black and
the splashed varieties and fifty per cent, of the blue.
Careful examination of this question from the Mendelian
standpoint has revealed the fact that the black and
the splashed " wasters " are really pure races, and that
they behave as such when they are bred. The Blue
Andalusian, though it has always been spoken of as
" pure/' is really a mongrel, and must always remain
so ; in fact, it has been found that the simplest method
of breeding Blue Andalusians is to mate the black
and splashed forms together. In this particular case
the mongrel does not follow Mendelian laws, for it is a
mongrel not resembling either of its parents, and there
are no dominants and no recessives. Under these
circumstances it becomes impossible to say which of
the two parent forms possesses the additional factor.

It is not possible or necessary to follow up this point
any further, but it will serve to show the interesting
vistas of inquiry opened up by investigations conducted
on the lines inaugurated by Mendel. Take the whole
question of coloration in flowers, and its cause. At
present it would seem as if the colour of a flower were
due to two interacting causes or substances. One of
these is a perfectly colourless " chromogen " or colour-
producing basis. The other is one of those strange
substances, so elusive but so important, called " fer-
ments." This ferment exerts its activity upon the
chromogen and induces a process of oxidation, and this
process leads to the formation of the substance which
gives the blossom its exquisite colour. Prolonged experi-
ments on the sweet-pea seem to prove that the colour
there depends upon two factors, each of which is inde-
pendently transmitted according to the ordinary scheme
of Mendelian inheritance. How these two bodies exist
in the gametes, whether as we now know them in the

176

Johann Gregor Mendel 13

flower, or in some other form, is at present an undecided
question.

We may now inquire how Mendel's experiments bear
upon the problem of heredity. What light do they throw
upon this difficult problem ? No one disputes the fact
that certain characters possessed by individuals can be
and are inherited. Mendel was not the first to discern
this principle; he was, however, the first who clearly
showed how, in certain cases at least, the transmission of
parental qualities may be brought about. Moreover, he
opened a way to further investigation of the subject.
The forerunners of Mendel did indeed suspect the exist-
ence of a definite law governing the transmission of
hereditary characters, but through imperfect methods
of experiment failed to discover the principles which
have since become Mendel's title to renown. The logical
result of his discovery — its practical application, in other
words — lies in the possibility, within certain limits, of
controlling the course of hereditary transmission.
Applied to plants and animals, it is possible now for
horticulturists and breeders to ascertain how new varieties
arise, and of what elements they are composed ; con-
sequently they are able to propagate such varieties with
greater success than heretofore, and weed out when
necessary undesirable forms.

One of the most striking applications of Mendelian
principles has been the development of a variety of
wheat which is not susceptible to the attack of " rust."
It was found by experiment that resistance to rust
disease was a recessive character, in the Mendelian sense,
so that by assiduously cultivating this form a sufficiency
of seed was obtained from which wheat was grown which
was not attacked by the disease even when growing
among or near diseased plants.

With regard to inheritance within the human race,
the application of Mendel's principles is more difficult,

177

14 Johann Gregor Mendel

for many reasons. Their confirmation has to be sought
in the genealogical histories of families in which some
obvious and special characteristic is constantly known to
appear. From such data it may be ascertained whether
the transmission of these characters agrees with what one
might expect according to Mendelian principles.

No one would be so rash as to claim that Mendel's
views have been received with complete assent on the
part of the scientific world. Some have disputed their
accuracy at times with almost virulent criticism. Others
hold the highest opinion of them, and have not hesitated
to claim that Mendel has given the scientific world a key
with which many of the secret chambers of nature may
be opened. Thus, for example, Mr. Lock, in his very
interesting book on Recent Progress in the Study of
Variation, Heredity, and Evolution (1906), expresses his
opinion that " the recent revival of work upon the
subject of inheritance by the use of breeding methods
has, as a matter of fact, already been rewarded with
results as valuable and as clear as could possibly
have been anticipated — results which are sufficient in
themselves to show that the discovery made by Mendel
was of an importance little inferior to those of a Newton
or a Dalton."

Of this there can be no doubt, that Mendel's papers,
when rediscovered, gave the stimulus to that remarkable
outburst of experimentation with regard to inheritance
by breeding methods above alluded to; and "thence-
forward," says Mr Punnett in the third edition of his
useful book on Mendelism (1911), "the record has been
one of steady progress, and the result of ten years' work
has been to establish more and more firmly the funda-
mental nature of Mendel's discovery. The scheme of
inheritance, which he was the first to enunciate, has been
found to hold good for such diverse things as height,
hairiness, and flower colour and flower form in plants,
the shape of pollen grains, and the structure of fruits ;

Johann Gregor Mendel 15

while among animals the coat colour of mammals, the
form of the feathers and of the comb in poultry, the
waltzing habit of Japanese mice, and eye colour in man
are but a few examples of the diversity of characters
which all follow the same law of transmission/'

Without going into the further details mentioned in
the above passage, enough has been said to show the
importance of Mendel's work, before which the much-
vaunted doctrine of natural selection fades into insigni-
ficance. We cannot, however, close this brief account of
the illustrious friar without a few remarks concerning
the long neglect of his work to which we have already
alluded. As we have seen, Mendel's discoveries were
first made known in 1865, but failed utterly to attract
the notice of biologists till the year 1900, when a con-
firmation of his laws was published on the Continent
by Tschermak, Correns, and De Vries, independently of
one another. From this date onwards a host of workers
has been engaged in this country and elsewhere in experi-
menting on Mendelian lines, both with plants and
animals, and with conspicuous success.

A prominent Mendelian, Professor Bateson, to whom
we owe the introduction of Mendelism into this country,
alludes to this neglect in the following words: "This
episode in the history of science is not very pleasant to
contemplate. There are of course many similar examples,
but these must be few in which the discovery so long
neglected was at once so significant, so simple, and withal
so easy to verify.

" The cause," he continues, " is unquestionably to be
found in that neglect of the experimental study of the
problem of species which supervened on the general
acceptance of the Darwinian doctrines. The problem
of species, as Kolreuter, Gaertner, Naudin, Wichura,
and the other hybridists conceived it, attracted hence-
forth no workers. The question, it was imagined, had
been answered and the debate ended." This writer adds,

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16 Johann Gregor Mendel

moreover : " Had Mendel's work come into the hands of
Darwin, it is not too much to say that the history of the
development of evolutionary philosophy would have
been very different from that which we have witnessed "
(Bateson, Mendel's Principles of Heredity, 1909).

Mendel himself was convinced of the importance of
his discovery, and is said to have repeated frequently,
" Meine Zeit wird schon kommen " (" My time will soon
come •") ; but, failing to arouse the enthusiasm of his friend
Nageli, he does not seem to have made any further
effort to spread his views.

The career of this notable priest furnishes another
example of the truism that neither the practice of the
Catholic faith nor its fuller realization in the religious
life is a hindrance to the pursuits of science. Rather
may it be said that, guided by the light which the Catholic
faith imparts, many occasions of error are avoided. To
the Christian man of science it is obvious that, important
as science is as regards both the increase of knowledge
and the welfare of humanity, it does not embrace the
sum total of truth. There exists a higher, a Divine,
science to which the science of created things must
inevitably lead those who think aright, whose minds
are not obscured by passion or prejudice, whose sole
desire is to discover the truth wherever it exists, and who
realize that passing opinions cannot be the last expression
of truth. Truth is one, but sincerity is required to
discover it.

1 80

m Hf

LOUIS PASTEUR

(1822-1895)

BY E. J. M'WEENEY, M.A., M.D., F.R.C.P.I.,

Professor of Pathology and Bacteriology, University College, Dublin.

(The writer desires to acknowledge his indebtedness
to two excellent biographies — The Life of Pasteur, by M.
Rene Vallery-Radot (son-in-law of Pasteur), and the
volume entitled Pasteur, by Professor and Mrs. Percy
Frankland, in " The Century Science Series." From
one or other of these works most of the facts hereinafter
set forth have been obtained.)

Louis PASTEUR was born in 1822 at D61e, a small town
in the east of France. His father, Jean-Joseph Pasteur,
was a soldier of the great Napoleon, and fought in the
Peninsular War. Later on he married and set up in
business as a tanner at D61e.

He seems to have been a most respectable type of
old soldier. His language and manners were not those
of a retired sergeant ; he never spoke of his campaigns,
and never entered a cafe. On Sundays, wearing
a military-looking frock-coat, spotlessly clean, and
adorned with the showy ribbon of the Legion of Honour,
he used to go out walking on the vine-bordered road
leading from Arbois to Besangon. Although far from
prosperous, he contrived to give his son, Louis, a liberal
education. He sent him up to Paris for a while, and
10 181 i

2 Louis Pasteur

afterwards caused him to take his degree (Bachelier-es-
Lettres) at the Royal College of Besangon. Pasteur
retained through life the liveliest recollections of all his
father had done for him, and gave expression to this
gratitude in the following noble words, which form the
dedication of one of his scientific works : —

" A la memoire de mon pere, ancien militaire sous

le Premier Empire, Chevalier de la Legion

d'Honneur.
Plus j'ai avance en age, mieux j'ai compris ton

amitie et la superiorite de ta raison.
Les efforts que j'ai consacres a ces 6tudes, et a

celles qui les ont precedees, sont le fruit de

tes exemples et de tes conseils.
Voulant honorer ces pieux souvenirs, je de*die cet

ouvrage a ta meJnoire."

(To the memory of my father, an old soldier of the
First Empire, and a Knight of the Legion of Honour.

The longer I have lived, the better I have understood
thy warmth of heart and thy strength of mind.

The labour which I have devoted to these studies, as
well as to their forerunners, is the fruit of thy example
and of thy counsel.

Desirous of honouring these affectionate remembrances,
I dedicate this work to thy memory.)

Pasteur graduated at the age of eighteen, and
although his father would have been delighted to see
his clever son settled down as professor at the local
college, his old schoolmaster saw that he was destined
for higher things, and urged him to take out special
courses of instruction in mathematics and chemistry,
so as to qualify for entrance to the great ficole Normale
of Paris — the training school of French scientists and
professors. Louis followed this counsel, and went for
the entrance examination in 1842, at the age of twenty.

182

Louis Pasteur 3

He qualified for admission, but only passed fifteenth out
of twenty-two candidates. Most young men would have
been satisfied at passing anyhow. Not so Pasteur.
Dissatisfied with this performance, he refused admission,
took another year's work, went up again, and this time
passed in with fourth place. Meanwhile he supported
himself by teaching mathematics at a Paris boarding-
school, where he gave private lessons from six to seven
in the morning. One wonders what a youth of the
present generation would think of these hours. " Do
not be anxious about my health and work," he wrote
home. " I need hardly get up till 5.45 ; you see, it is
not so early."

It was at this period that Pasteur began to feel an
enthusiasm for chemistry. In a letter dated gth Decem-
ber 1842, he writes : " I attend, at the Sorbonne, the
lectures of M. Dumas, a celebrated chemist. You
cannot imagine what a crowd of people come to these
lectures. The room is immense and always quite full.
We have to be there half an hour before the time to get
a good place, as you would in a theatre ; there is also
a good deal of applause ; there are always six or seven
hundred people."

Our young scientist was not the type of man to take
for granted any dictum laid down by his teachers, how-
ever distinguished. He insisted on verifying everything
and working out everything for himself. He was assid-
uous at his attendance at the chemical laboratory, and
was in the habit of trying, on his own account, the ex-
periments described, but not actually done, at the lecture.
Thus, for example, when the process of making phos-
phorus was merely explained but not actually carried
out, on account of its being so tedious, Pasteur would
not rest content. He bought a quantity of bones at
the butcher's and set to work. He burnt them, reduced
them to a fine ash, treated this with sulphuric acid, and
went through all the other stages of the process. The

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4 Louis Pasteur

work took him from four in the morning till nine at night ;
but what was the labour compared with the joy of
possessing sixty grammes of pure phosphorus of his own
manufacture !

Endowed by God with such a spirit as this, it was not
surprising that Pasteur should be selected by his superiors
for promotion. He passed his Licence examination, and
then the higher one called the Agrigation with special
distinction in physics and chemistry. This was in 1846.
A few months later the Minister of Public Instruction
wanted to make him Professor of Physics at a Lycee at
Tournon, but his teacher, the eminent Balard (discoverer
of bromine), represented that it would be rank folly to
bury so promising a talent in the provinces, and suc-
ceeded in having the appointment cancelled. Pasteur,
left to his laboratory work, at once proceeded to prepare
for his final degree of Doctor of Science by undertaking
some investigations on the application of crystallography
and physics to chemical problems. He prepared a
thesis on " The Phenomena relative to the Rotatory
Polarization of Liquids," and duly obtained his Doctorate
in 1847. His attention became concentrated on the
optical properties of certain crystalline substances by
virtue of which some of them rotate the plane of polariza-
tion to the right, whilst others do so to the left. In 1844
a distinguished German chemist, Mitscherlich, had dis-
covered that the two varieties of tartaric acid possessed
different optical properties. (Here I may explain that this
is the acid obtained from the crusty deposits called
" tartar " in old wine barrels.) The common variety
(ordinary tartaric acid) rotates the plane of polarized
light to the right, whilst the rarer sort (para-tartaric or
racemic acid) possesses no rotatory power. Pasteur, who
had been studying crystallography and had acquired
skill in the use of the goniometer, was much interested
in Mitscherlich's discovery. He prepared a fine set of
crystals of tartaric acid and its compounds. He could

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Louis Pasteur 5

not understand why it was that the two varieties,
though absolutely identical in the nature and number
of their atoms and in their crystalline forms, should
yet behave differently towards the beam of polarized
light. He subjected his crystals to a more minute
and painstaking examination than they had ever
undergone previously, and succeeded in discovering
on the crystals of the optically active tartrate
certain minute faces, which had escaped the attention
of the most accomplished crystallographers of the day.
He then ascertained that the crystals of the optically
inactive tartrate were symmetrical — in other words, when
looked at in a mirror they gave an image upon which the
crystals could be accurately superposed. The crystals
of the optically active acid were dis-symmetrical — their
mirror-image was not identical with themselves, but they
bore the same relation to it that the right hand bears to the
left. The next thing Pasteur did was to try various ways
of crystallizing the optically inactive acid, and he at last
found a method by which he obtained two different sorts
of crystals, one sort being the optically active variety,
already known, whilst the other set were identical with
the mirror-image of these, and had never previously
been seen. He at once saw that these latter crystals
might possess optical properties that would exactly
counterbalance those of the optically active ingredient —
in other words, that they ought to rotate the plane of
polarization to the left. Accordingly he carefully picked
out the crystals of the new variety, dissolved them and
tested them in the polarimeter, whereupon he found, to
his joy, that they turned the plane through just the same
angle to the left as the others did to the right. Pasteur's
acute and perspicacious mind instantly grasped the far-
reaching importance of his discovery, and, rushing from
the laboratory, overcome with emotion, he encountered
his friend Bertrand in the corridor, and, embracing him,
poured the good news into his sympathetic ears.

6 Louis Pasteur

This observation of Pasteur's, made in 1848, was the
first glimpse of mankind into molecular architecture — a
study which has for its object the discovery not merely
of the numbers and kinds of atoms that go to make up a
compound, but their actual arrangement in three-dimen-
sional space It is true that the full consequences of
Pasteur's work were not foreseen at the time even by
himself. The study of organic chemistry was not then
sufficiently advanced. Over twenty years had still to
elapse before Wislicenus made a similar observation
with regard to lactic acid. Le Bel and van t' Hoff were
then able to rear the now majestic edifice of stereo-
chemistry upon the foundations laid so far back as 1848
by Pasteur. And all this is not merely barren know-
ledge. It is fraught with consequences the most important
to the human race. Thanks to the accurate conceptions
of stereo-chemistry, we can now construct new chemical
compounds with the precision of an engineer constructing
a machine, and for purposes as definite. We can build
up new drugs and foretell what their physiological
effects will be. We can secure refreshing sleep, reduce
fever, and stay the ravages of some of the worst disease-
producing parasites, to the attacks of which our human
bodies are liable.

Even though all the consequences of this first discovery
of Pasteur's were not at the time foreseen, yet, proceeding
as it did from a young man of twenty-five, it excited
incredulity in the breasts of many senior men, who had
worked for long years in the same field, but with less
success. Pasteur's paper was referred for report to the
greatest living authority, Biot, who sent for the young
man and made him repeat the experiment with materials
provided by himself (Biot), and under the most stringent
conditions. One glance at the optical instrument
proved Pasteur in the right, and the illustrious old
scientist, who saw the glory of his years of labour thrown
into the shade by his young disciple, grasped him by the

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Louis Pasteur 7

hand, and in tones of deep emotion murmured : " My dear
boy, I have so loved science all my life through, that this
discovery of yours makes my heart throb with joy."

Shortly after this Pasteur lost his mother through
apoplexy. He was tenderly attached to her — he could
no longer work, but asked for leave of absence, and
remained for weeks plunged in grief and incapable of
intellectual exertion.

On his return to Paris it was felt that something ought
to be done for him, and he was at first sent to teach
physics at Dijon. This appointment was not looked
upon by Biot and his other scientific friends as sufficiently
important for a man of his capacity, and so he was sent
to Strasburg (then of course belonging to France) as
Professor of Chemistry — a post that suited him well, as
the numerous industries of Alsace stood much in need
of applied chemistry. Here he became intimate with
the family of the President of the College, M. Laurent —
an intimacy that proved a turning point in his career,
for he proposed to and was accepted by the President's
daughter, Mdlle. Marie Laurent. In this important
concern Pasteur's insight proved as unerring as it was
in other and widely different spheres. The young couple
were married on agth May 1848, and the union proved in
every way successful. Madame Pasteur took the deepest
interest in her husband's work, shielded him as much
as possible from worry, wrote out his daily notes from
dictation, and rendered his home life one of unclouded
happiness. During the following years everything
seemed to smile on him. Three fair children in the home
— a sympathetic helpmate to whom he recounted each
evening the results of his work during the day, who
never scolded him save for not taking enough care of his
health, and who was indeed soda rei humana etque
divince — such were the elements which, together with
acknowledged merit and security from disturbance in
his work, made up at this period the life of Pasteur.

1 8;

8 Louis Pasteur

To follow his labours during the period of six years
which he spent at Strasburg would exceed the limits
of this brief memoir. Let it suffice to say that he per-
severed in his study of dis-symmetrical crystalline com-
pounds, and made the important discovery that right- and
left-handed bodies, though chemically identical, are
widely different in their behaviour towards living things ;
so that fermentative organisms growing in a mixture of
such bodies will use up only the right-handed, and reject
the left-handed tartaric acid. In this way it is possible
to separate the optically active compounds. For these
researches Pasteur received in 1856 the Rumford Medal
of the Royal Society of England — one of the greatest
distinctions in the gift of English science.

After spending three years at Lille, as Professor and
Principal of the new Faculty of Science, Pasteur was
recalled to Paris to take up the post of Director of
Scientific Studies at the ficole Normale. All the time
he could spare from lecturing was devoted to a study of
the nature of fermentation. The great German scientist,
Liebig, persisted in looking upon the processes of decay,
decomposition, and fermentation as of purely physico-
chemical character. He considered that the beer yeast
was as dead as the wort it fermented. In his own words :
" Beer-yeast, and in general all animal and vegetable
matters in putrefaction, impart to other bodies the state
of decomposition in which they are themselves. The
movement which, by the disturbed equilibrium, is
impressed on their own elements, is communicated also
to the elements of bodies in contact with them." In
another oft-quoted passage, Liebig says : " Those who
attempt to explain the putrefaction of animal substances
by the presence of animacules, argue much in the same
way as a child who imagines that he can explain the
rapidity of the Rhine's flow by attributing it to the
violent agitation caused by the numerous water-wheels
at Mayence." Pasteur was led by his own researches

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Louis Pasteur 9

boldly to claim for living " animacules " the r6Ie denied
them by Liebig and his followers. He proved, beyond
all doubt, that these minute living things oxydized the
organic matter in the fluid, and thus caused it to break
up into simpler compounds. He discovered a new group
of living things called an&robes, because they live with-
out air, and showed that they play an important part
in the processes of fermentation and putrefaction. At
that time, life was thought to be absolutely dependent
upon air for its maintenance, and Pasteur's discovery
of organisms to which air was a poison, and which
could only unfold their activities in its absence, seemed
nothing short of a revolution.

Arising out of, and closely allied to, these investigations
was the great struggle about " spontaneous generation."
The question whether life originates spontaneously had
been answered in the affirmative by several well-known
writers. Readers of the classics will remember Virgil's
description of the way in which a swarm of bees can be
made to originate from the rotting carcase of a young
bull. Nowadays we smile at the crudity of the idea,
whilst marvelling at the beauty of the verse in which
the old Roman has enshrined it. A still cruder and more
laughable assertion was made by Van Helmont, the
Belgian physician and alchemist, who actually supplies
a recipe for the spontaneous generation of the domestic
mouse. His prescription consists in squeezing some soiled
linen into the mouth of a vessel containing grains of wheat,
whereupon, after the lapse of about twenty-one days, the
wheat will be found to have been transformed into mice —
adult ones to boot, with both sexes equally represented !

Such mendacious statements had long been discredited
as regards the higher forms of life. But in Pasteur's
time many scientists were still to be found who main-
tained that the minuter forms, such as could only be seen
with the microscope, made their appearance spontane-
ously, that is, without arising from pre-existing germs,

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io Louis Pasteur

in decomposing organic infusions, dead bodies and the
like. About the middle of the eighteenth century the
question had been freely debated, the leaders being two
clergymen, our own countryman, Needham, on the side
of spontaneous generation, or generatio cequivoca, as it
was then called, and the Italian, Spallanzani, against it.
In Pasteur's time the leading advocate of spontaneous
generation was Pouchet, Director of the Natural History
Museum in Rouen, who came forward with a paper
entitled " A Note on Vegetable and Animal Proto-
organisms spontaneously generated in Artificial Air and
Oxygen Gas." Pasteur entered the lists against this
opinion, and devoted four years to a struggle in which
he ultimately proved victorious. He took enormous
pains with his experiments, and made some useful
discoveries en route, so to speak, such as the efficiency of
a cotton-wool plug in the neck of a flask as a means of
preventing the entrance of air germs. He also invented
a flask with a long-drawn-out neck, curved downwards
like the bent neck of a swan, known to the present day
as Pasteur's flask. By this means he showed that,
without any plug at all, a putrescible liquid boiled in
such a flask would keep good indefinitely owing to the
fact that the air coming in deposited its germs on the
moist inside of the curved neck, so that they did not
gain access to the fluid. He took a trip to the Alps,
bringing with him dozens of flasks charged with putres-
cible fluid, and with their necks (straight ones this time)
drawn into sharp points which were hermetically sealed.
He climbed the Montanvert, attended by a guide with a
mule carrying the case containing the precious vessels.
He opened thirteen of them in the inn, where the air was
more or less foul and dusty, and sealed them in a few
minutes. Next day he brought twenty more to the
Mer de Glace, opened them for a short time, and resealed
them with a blow-pipe. Nearly all of the first series
went bad, whereas of the twenty opened on the Mer de

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Louis Pasteur n

Glace, only one became altered. In this way Pasteur
showed that it is the presence of dust in the air, and not
the air itself, that brings about fermentation. In reply
to contrary results recorded by Pouchet, Pasteur was
always able to show some flaw in the experiment whereby
air germs were allowed to obtain access — in one case,
for instance, with the mercury used by Pouchet for clos-
ing the mouths of his flasks. In the end, the Academy
of Sciences decided in his favour by awarding him the
prize in a competition for the best experimental work on
spontaneous generation. The affair got into the news-
papers ; the fashionable crowd in Paris, where the Second
Empire was then at the zenith of its glory, became
interested, and Pasteur was invited to give a popular
lecture on the results of his work. All Paris came to
hear the serious-looking man, his face full of quiet energy
and reflective force. After giving his audience a glimpse
of his laboratory methods and results, he concluded as
follows : " And, therefore, gentlemen, I would point to
that liquid and say to you, I have taken my drop of
water from the immensity of creation, and I have taken
it full of the elements suitable for the development of
inferior beings. And I wait, I watch, I question it,
begging it to recommence for me the beautiful spectacle
of the first creation. But it is dumb, dumb since these
experiments were begun several years ago ; it is dumb
because I have kept it from the only thing man cannot
produce, from the germs that float in the air ; from life,
for life is a germ and a germ is life. Never will the
doctrine of spontaneous generation recover from the
mortal blow of this simple experiment. . . . No, there
is now no circumstance known in which it can be affirmed
that microscopic beings came into the world without
germs, without parents similar to themselves. Those
who affirm it have been duped by illusions, by ill-con-
ducted experiments spoilt by errors, that they either did
not perceive or did not know how to avoid."

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12 Louis Pasteur

By the work thus accomplished, with a different object,
Pasteur had laid the foundation of the then unthought-of
science of bacteriology. The researches thus outlined
constitute a turning point in his career. He never went
back to the physico-chemical questions that had engrossed
his earlier years, but devoted the rest of his active life
to the elucidation of biological problems. The study of
fermentation led him to inquire into the causes why that
process, as industrially conducted, in the manufacture
of wine, for example, of beer, of vinegar, not unfrequently
" goes wrong," with the result that sour wine, bad beer
and vinegar, more like dirty water than anything else,
are produced, to the disappointment and loss of the
manufacturer. These undesirable results he found to
be due to the intrusion and multiplication of extraneous
germs in the fermenting mixtures. He found out that
by previously heating to about 55° or 60° C. (130-140° F.),
most of these objectionable or " wild " organisms could
be killed off and the soil left fallow, so to speak, for the
rightful or cultivated ferments, which were thus allowed
to do their useful work undisturbed. This process of
" Pasteurization " still goes by its discoverer's name,
and in this country is chiefly practised in the dairy. By
pushing the process still further, he found that all
microbic life could be killed off — the process we now
know as sterilization.

Ever fruitful in bold generalizations, Pasteur now
began to ask himself whether disease in man and the
higher animals might not, like the so-called maladies of
beer, wine, vinegar, etc., be due to the intrusion of
minute organisms which, by setting up processes allied
to fermentation in the bodies of their victims, could
bring about the disturbances of health that we call
disease. His first essay in this field was one of peculiar
difficulty. It was the investigation of a malady of
silkworms called Pebrine, which had assumed serious
proportions in 1865, had pulled down the annual revenue

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Louis Pasteur 13

from this source by over 100 million francs, and reduced
hundreds of formerly prosperous silk cultivators to
destitution. Here Pasteur found himself confronted
with two separate and distinct maladies, often existing
in the same magnanerie (the name given to a farm where
silkworms are raised). One was the real " pebrine,"
due to a protozoal organism. The other was " flacherie,"
due to an actively motile bacillus. With infinite pains
he succeeded in disentangling the ravelled skein of
morbid phenomena, showed how both maladies might
be prevented, and thus earned for himself the eternal
gratitude not only of his fellow-countrymen, but also
of the foreigner. In 1867 he was awarded the grand
prize medal of the Exhibition. In 1868 he received the
honorary degree of Doctor of Medicine from the Uni-
versity of Bonn, and a prize of 5000 florins offered by
the Austrian Government to the discoverer of the best
way of preventing the malady of silkworms. In 1869
our own Royal Society elected him one of its foreign
members. More recently (in 1896), the town of Alais,
the staple industry of which, silk-raising, profited so
largely by his exertions, displayed its gratitude by
erecting a statue to its benefactor. It shows us Pasteur
in the act of attentively examining a sprig of mulberry
covered with cocoons. About this time he applied to
the Government for a special grant towards a new
laboratory, of which he stood badly in need, and was
overjoyed when the Emperor took the matter up and
caused the minister concerned to set apart 30,000 francs
(£1200) for the purpose.

But Pasteur's life became overfull. His results as
regards silkworms were called in question, and he had
to do a great deal of additional work in order to confirm
them. Moreover, he met with severe domestic bereave-
ment, his father and his two little daughters dying about
the same time. When he had to start work after his
brief seaside holiday in September 1868, he was struck

193,

14 Louis Pasteur

down with a malady of the gravest kind — paralysis of
one side with disturbance of speech. He was most
devotedly nursed by his wife, and several of his scientific
friends took turns at watching by his bedside. He him-
self thought that he was going to die, and regretted it ;
for, as he said, " I should like to have been able to accom-
plish more for my country." It seemed so hard to die
at forty-six in the very midst of his work. To the delight
of everyone, his mental powers remained unimpaired,
the paralysis gradually relaxed its grip, and he was able
to move about once more, though he never fully recovered
the use of his limbs.

The Government now decided to confer still further
honour on Pasteur by giving him a seat in the Senate.
But before this could be done, a catastrophe of appalling
suddeness had laid the Second Empire in ruins. The
triumphant cohorts of Germany poured like a torrent
across the fair land of France. The people turned with
fury against the Napoleonic Dynasty, by which they
considered themselves as betrayed, and, after the awful
convulsions of the Commune, set up the Republican
form of government that still holds sway in France.
Pasteur was a typical Frenchman, full of the most
ardent patriotism. He wished to be enrolled in the
Garde Rationale, but had to be reminded that a half-
paralyzed man is unfit for service. His son went to the
war. Pasteur senior tried to go on with his work, but
could not. He was overwhelmed by the redoubled
calamities that fell upon his unhappy country, and was
prevailed upon to quit Paris and retire to Arbois, where
he had a little house and vineyard. On learning the
news of his country's downfall at Sedan, he took up his
pen and wrote the following characteristic letter to his
pupil Raulin : " What folly, what blindness there are
in the inertia of Austria, Russia, England ! What
ignorance in our army leaders ! We scientists were in-
deed right when we deplored the poverty of the Depart-

194

Louis Pasteur 15

rnent of Public Instruction. There lies the real cause of
our misfortunes. It is not with impunity that a great
nation is allowed to lose its intellectual standard. . . .
We are paying the penalty of fifty years' forgetfulness
of science, of its conditions of development, of its im-
mense influence on the life of a great people, and of all
that might have assisted the diffusion of light. ... I
cannot go on : all this hurts me. I try to put away all
such memories, and also the sight of our terrible distress,
in which it seems that a desperate resistance is the only
hope we have left. I wish that France may fight to
her last man, to her last fortress. I wish that the war
may be prolonged until the winter, when, the elements
aiding us, all these vandals may perish of cold and
distress. Every one of my future works will bear on
its title-page the words, ' Hatred to Prussia. Revenge !
revenge ! ' '

In such a frame of mind it is not surprising that
Pasteur should have cast about for some means of showing
the enemies of his country the view he took of themselves
and their proceedings. He bethought him of the diploma
of M.D., honoris causd, bestowed on him a few years
previously by the University of Bonn — a distinction
that had given him much pleasure at the time. " Now,"
he wrote to the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Bonn,
" the sight of the parchment is hateful to me. I feel
insulted at seeing my name, with the designation virum
clarissimum which you have conferred upon it, placed
under the auspices of a name which is henceforth an ob-
ject of execration to my country — that of Rex Gulielmus.
Whilst sincerely expressing my profound respect for
you, sir, and for the celebrated professors who have
affixed their signatures to the decision of your Faculty,
I must obey my conscience by asking you to efface my
name from your archives, and to take back your diploma
as a token of the indignation inspired in a French scientist
by the barbarism and hypocrisy of one who, in order to

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1 6 Louis Pasteur

satisfy his criminal pride, persists in the massacre of
two great peoples."

The German's reply was equally characteristic. " Sir —
The undersigned, now Principal of the Faculty of Medicine
of Bonn, is requested to answer the insult which you have
dared to offer to the German nation in the sacred person
of its august Emperor, King Wilhelm of Prussia, by
sending you the expression of its entire contempt. —
Maurice Naumann. P.S. — Desiring to keep its papers
free from taint, the Faculty herewith returns your screed."

Pasteur's rejoinder contained the following passage:
"And now, Mr. Principal, after reading over both your
letter and mine, I sorrow in my heart to think that men
who, like yourself and myself, have spent a lifetime in
the pursuit of truth and progress should address each
other in such a fashion. This is but one of the results
of the character your Emperor has given to this war.
You speak to me of taint. Mr. Principal, you may be
assured that taint will rest until far distant ages on the
memory of those who began the bombardment of Paris,
when capitulation by famine was inevitable, and who
continued this act of savagery after it had become evident
to all men that it would not advance by one hour the
surrender of the heroic city."

Like his grandfather, Pasteur's son served in the army
as a non-commissioned officer, and, as there was no news
of him, his father, accompanied by Madame Pasteur
and their daughter, set out to look for the boy amongst
the scattered remnants of the Eastern Army Corps.
After a search as anxious as it was hazardous, they came
across the young man and took him across the frontier
into Switzerland, where he recovered from an illness due
to fatigue and privation. He afterwards rejoined his
regiment. Whilst awaiting the moment when he could
resume his scientific activities, Pasteur reflected deeply
on the causes that had brought about what seemed at
the time to be the irretrievable downfall of his beloved

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Louis Pasteur 17

country. " The victim of her political instability," he
wrote, " France had done nothing to keep up, to propa-
gate, and to develop the progress of science in our land ;
she has lived on the past, thinking herself great by the
scientific discoveries to which she owed her material
prosperity, but not perceiving that she was allowing
the springs of those discoveries to become dry, whilst
neighbouring nations were diverting them to their own
benefit and rendering them fruitful by their work, their
efforts, and their sacrifices. Whilst Germany was
multiplying her universities, establishing between them
the most salutary emulation, bestowing honour and
consideration on the masters and doctors, creating
vast laboratories amply supplied with the most perfect
instruments, France, enervated by revolutions, ever
seeking for the best form of government, was giving but
scanty attention to her establishments for higher edu-
cation.

" The cultivation of science in its highest expression
is perhaps even more necessary to the moral condition
than to the material prosperity of a nation.

" Great discoveries — the manifestation of thought in
art, in science, and in letters — in a word, the disinterested
exercise of the mind in every direction and the centre of
instruction from which it radiates, introduce into the
whole of society that philosophical or scientific spirit,
that spirit of discernment, which submits everything to
severe reasoning, condemns ignorance, and scatters errors
and prejudices. They raise the intellectual level and
the moral sense, and, through them, the Divine idea
itself is spread abroad and intensified."

Melancholy as were Pasteur's reflections at this sad
crisis in his country's fortunes, they would have been
incomparably more bitter still had he been aware that,
if the consequences of his own researches had been as
well understood in France as they were abroad, the lives
of many thousands of gallant Frenchmen then dying of

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1 8 Louis Pasteur

their wounds received on the field of battle might have
been preserved. Germ-borne diseases, as deadly as they
were preventible — suppuration, blood-poisoning, ery-
sipelas, gangrene — were rampant in the French military
hospitals, and proved to be veritable scourges which
the surgeons, not realizing their true nature, confessed
themselves equally unable to cure and to avert. And
yet three years had already elapsed since the brilliant
young Edinburgh surgeon, Dr. (now Lord) Lister, had
laid down those methods of antiseptic treatment which,
long years after, he ascribed in the following noble words
to the teachings of Pasteur. " Truly," said Lister,
addressing Pasteur on the occasion of his jubilee celebra-
tion, " there does not exist in the entire world any indi-
vidual to whom the medical sciences owe more than they
do to you. Your researches on fermentation have thrown
a powerful beam which has lightened the baleful darkness
of surgery, and has transformed the treatment of wounds
from a matter of uncertain, and too often dangerous,
empiricism into a scientific art of sure beneficence.
Thanks to you, surgery has undergone a complete re-
volution, which has deprived it of its terrors and has
extended almost without limit its efficacious power."

Shortly after the war, Pasteur, although not a doctor,
was elected a member of the Academy of Medicine. He
visited the hospitals and noticed how wounds were
bandaged without being properly cleaned, so that foul-
smelling pus accumulated in them, and soon produced
general blood-poisoning. By the aid of the microscope
he pointed out to the half-incredulous surgeons the
micro-organisms swarming in the purulent matter, and
entered into details as to the precautions necessary to
get rid of the germs present in the wound and in the
dressings. He prescribed that all instruments should be
passed through a flame, and that all the dressings
should be heated to a very high temperature, in order
to destroy the germs.

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Louis Pasteur 19

The old wrong ideas did not die without a struggle.
There were not wanting doctors who resented the in-
trusion of a mere laboratory scientist, and a non-medical
man to boot, into what they regarded as purely pro-
fessional matters. They scoffed at Pasteur's bacteria
and at " laboratory surgery," which, as one of them,
Dr. Chassaignac, said, " has destroyed very many
animals and saved very few human beings." " Every-
thing," he went on to say, " cannot be resolved into a
question of bacteria ! " And then, sarcastically, little
thinking how near the truth he was, "Typhoid fever,
bacterization ! Hospital miasma, bacterization ! "

Despite these scoffers, Pasteur's ideas, proved as they
were up to the hilt by conclusive experiments, carried
the day. His merit was now universally recognized,
and a bill was introduced into the French Parliament
to bestow upon him some substantial token of his
country's gratitude. The Government suggested a life
annuity of 12,000 francs (£480). " The amount," said
the introducer, " is indeed small when compared with the
value of the services rendered, . . . but the economic
and hygienic results of M. Pasteur's discoveries will
presently become so considerable, that the French
nation will desire to increase later on its testimony of
gratitude towards him, and towards science, of which
he is one of the most glorious representatives." Half
the amount of the annuity was to go to Pasteur's widow.
The bill was passed by 532 votes against 24.

It was at this moment of triumph that Pasteur's
attention became definitely concentrated on the nature
and causation of disease. By a remarkable, perhaps an
unprecedented, transition, the man who had begun by
studying the nature and properties of crystals, who had
then probed to the bottom the chemical mysteries of
the brewer's vat and wine cask, who had spent years in
combating the doctrine of spontaneous generation,
now found himself engrossed by the problems of infectious

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2O Louis Pasteur

disease. Arrived at a period of life (fifty-five) when
many men are thinking of retiring from active labours,
Pasteur plunged with enthusiasm into the investigation
of questions that lay altogether outside his real province,
which was that of chemistry and physics. The efficiency
and resourcefulness of his experimental work in a
department for which his early training might be said —
had he been an ordinary man — to have absolutely
unfitted him, are certainly calculated to evoke our
wonder and admiration.

The first maladies that attracted his attention were
those affecting domestic animals, and thus inflicting
injury on the agricultural industries of his dear native
land. For years a mysterious disease called charbon,
or splenic fever, had been making havoc among the sheep
in the pastoral provinces of Beauce, Brie, Burgundy, and
Auvergne. Sheep so stricken often died within a few
hours : they drooped their heads, gasped for breath,
blood-stained fluid came from their mouths and noses,
they fell and died, whilst after death the least cut on
the swollen carcase gave issue to black and viscid blood —
hence the name, " anthrax " (Greek for coal). Nor was
the disease confined to sheep. Oxen and horses also
suffered, and even man did not escape. Butchers or
shepherds who incautiously soiled their hands with blood
of the dead animals were often attacked with a hideous
swelling called " malignant pustule/' which, unless
thoroughly cauterized or excised, rapidly produced fatal
blood-poisoning.

About the year 1850, Davaine and also Rayer had put
under the microscope drops of blood taken from the
dying animals, and had seen little transparent motionless
rod-like bodies, which were not present in the blood of
healthy animals. Their discovery passed unheeded at
the time. About the time when Pasteur was thinking
of taking up the subject (1876), Robert Koch, then a
young country practitioner in a small town of East

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Louis Pasteur 21

Germany, announced that he had succeeded in growing
the little rods in the aqueous humour of an ox's eye, had
transplanted them from one drop to another, had seen
them grow out into long tangled filaments, and form
spores somewhat after the manner in which peas form
in the pod. Koch likewise showed that by injecting
the anthrax rods or bacilli, as they are now called, into
guinea-pigs, the disease could be reproduced. The same
effect was also produced by feeding animals with material
containing the spores. To all these researches it was
objected that not the bacilli but some other material
derived from the infected animal was the true cause — the
bacilli, said the objectors, are only its accompaniment.
This view Pasteur successfully refuted. He prepared a
series of flasks containing sterilized nutrient broth, and
introduced into the first of them, with the usual precau-
tions against accidental contamination, a minute trace
of blood from the infected animal. He set it aside in a
warm chamber to develop, and next day saw it quite
cloudy with flakes consisting of long chains of bacilli.
From this turbid liquid he transferred the minutest trace
to a second flask, got the same result, and so on from
day to day, till, say, ten or twenty flasks had been so
inoculated. He then tried the effect of injecting into an
animal a few drops of the liquid contained in the last of
the flasks, and found that it succumbed to anthrax. The
dilution to which the original droplet of blood had been
subjected was so inconceivably great that the disease
must clearly be attributed to the only thing derived
from that blood that persists through the whole series
of the flasks, namely, the bacilli : no matter how many
flasks were used, five, twenty, or a hundred, the result
was always the same. The bacillus and nothing but the
bacillus was responsible for the disease.

Further objections were raised. It was pointed out
that the blood of animals that never had anthrax, but
had been choked or felled and allowed to lie on the ground

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22 Louis Pasteur

for a day or two, contained bacteria like those of anthrax,
and would cause death, if inoculated.

Pasteur showed that the blood of such animals owed
its virulence to another disease germ, superficially
resembling that of anthrax, but differing from it in
being motile and in its inability to grow in the presence
of air. This germ he called Vibrion Septique. We now
know it under the name, bestowed by Koch, of the
bacillus of malignant cedema.

The next subject of Pasteur's researches was chicken-
cholera. In the blood of the affected fowls he soon
discovered what he termed little specks of extreme
minuteness. He had some difficulty in getting them to
grow outside the body, but at last succeeded in devising
a medium that suited them — a broth made of chicken
gristle, neutralized with potash and sterilized at a
temperature of 110° to 115° C. The smallest drop of
such a culture given to a chicken on a few bread crumbs
was sufficient to set up the disease. A chance observa-
tion made by Pasteur while studying this malady proved
to have momentous consequences. During his absence
on vacation his cultures were not renewed. On his
return, he found that these old cultures had become
incapable of causing the disease in its fatal form. Fowls
inoculated with them became ill, but recovered. These
same fowls, on being injected shortly afterwards with
fresh cultures of proved virulence, remained unaffected.
Pondering over this, Pasteur began to ask himself whether
some reliable way could not be found of so modifying a
virulent germ as to convert it into a harmless vaccine,
inoculation with which would protect the animal from
the naturally acquired disease. Accordingly, Pasteur
set about experimenting, and at last hit upon the
plan of forcing the anthrax germ to grow at a tem-
perature higher than that to which it was accustomed.
He found that when cultivated at 108° F. instead of 98°,
it soon lost its property of forming spores, and, moreover,

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Louis Pasteur 23

when inoculated, failed to kill, but only gave a mild
attack which protected against the virulent bacillus.
It was on the 28th of February 1881 that Pasteur came
forward at the Academie des Sciences with his memorable
paper on the Vaccine of Splenic Fever. He showed how
the degree of virulence could be exactly graduated, and
how it was possible to restore to the modified or " attenu-
ated " bacillus its primitive deadliness.

As usual, his conclusions were at first doubted, his
facts were called in question. The editor of one of the
veterinary journals, a M. Rossignol, wrote an ironical
article poking fun at him. " Microbiolatry," he wrote,
" is the fashion ; it is a doctrine that must not even be
discussed. Henceforth, the germ theory must have
precedence of clinical observation. The microbe alone
is true, and Pasteur is its prophet." Confident that
Pasteur's theories would break down under a practical
test on a large scale, Rossignol began an anti-microbe
campaign and collected money to procure animals for a
test. The programme was drawn up and left Pasteur
no loophole of retreat. Sixty sheep were to be procured
by the Melun Agricultural Society. Twenty-five of
these were to be vaccinated by two inoculations at twelve
or fifteen days' interval. Some days later, these twenty-
five, and also twenty-five others, were to be inoculated
with anthrax culture of high virulence. " The twenty-
five unvaccinated sheep will all perish," wrote Pasteur;
" the twenty-five vaccinated ones will all survive."
These latter were to be compared afterwards with the
ten sheep that had undergone no treatment in order to
show that the vaccination itself did no harm. There
were other conditions which made the test still more
stringent, and Pasteur's friends felt uneasy lest he might
have committed himself too deeply. " If he succeeds,"
wrote the veterinary press, " he will have endowed this
country with a great benefit, and his adversaries must
prepare to follow, chained and prostrate, the chariot of

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24 Louis Pasteur

the immortal victor. But he must succeed : such is
the price of triumph. Let M. Pasteur not forget that
the Tarpeian Rock is near the Capitol."

The experiment was duly carried out in the presence
of an immense crowd of witnesses, comprising the civil
authorities, delegates from agricultural, medical, and
veterinary societies, as well as many journalists. It
proved a complete success. Pasteur had a sleepless
night owing to some of the vaccinated animals showing a
sharp rise of temperature. It was no wonder, considering
that they had received a threefold fatal dose! In the
event they all recovered, and on the final day the carcases
of twenty-two of the unvaccinated sheep were lying side
by side in the farmyard, two others were expiring with
the characteristic symptoms of splenic fever,1 whilst all
the vaccinated sheep were in perfect health.

Pasteur's triumph was now complete and unquestion-
able. He found himself the most famous man in France.
The Government offered him the Grand Cordon of the
Legion of Honour. Pasteur would only accept it on
one condition : the red ribbon for his two fellow- workers,
Doctors Roux and Chamberland. " What I chiefly
wish," wrote he, " is that the discovery should be conse-
crated by an exceptional distinction to two devoted young
men." His condition was at once acceded to, and he
and his assistants received the coveted decorations.

Passing over many researches, some more, some less
successful, that occupied the last two decades of Pasteur's
well-filled life, we will conclude with a brief account of
his work on hydrophobia, or rabies. The mystery in
which this horrible disease was enshrouded had haunted
Pasteur's mind for many years. In 1880 he took up
work on it, his first material being provided by two mad
dogs sent into his laboratory by M. Bourrel, an old army
veterinarian, who had long been searching for a remedy

1 The twenty-fifth unvaccinated sheep died of anthrax a few days
later.

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Louis Pasteur 25

for this most justly dreaded of all maladies. One of
these dogs had the form known as dumb madness : his
jaw hung half opened and paralyzed, his tongue was
covered with foam, his eyes full of wistful anguish ; the
other, suffering from the ordinary or furious madness,
made savage darts at anything held out to him, with a
rabid glare in his bloodshot eyes, and gave vent to de-
spairing howls. Shortly afterwards, Pasteur learnt
from Professor Lannelongue that a child of five years,
bitten on the face a month previously, had just been
admitted into the H6pital Trousseau. Pasteur, over-
mastering his repugnance to the sight of pain, went to
see the poor little patient, who presented all the character-
istic symptoms — spasms and convulsions, ardent thirst,
combined with impossibility of swallowing. After
nearly twenty-four hours of agonizing torture, the child
died — suffocated by the mucus that filled its mouth.
Pasteur's first step was to take from the child a specimen
of the saliva, in which the virus of the disease was sup-
posed to be present, and inoculate it into rabbits.
They died in less than two days. He examined their
blood and found in it a microbe which he isolated and
studied. It proved highly virulent; but was it the
genuine microbe of hydrophobia ? The symptoms it
gave rise to were more like those of ordinary blood-
poisoning, and the incubation period was much too short.
Pasteur cautiously abstained from drawing any conclu-
sion. " I am absolutely ignorant," said he at the
Academy of Medicine, "of the connection there may be
between this new disease and hydrophobia." He then
tried experiments with saliva from persons suffering from
other maladies, and even from healthy adults, and often
obtained the new disease, "sputum-septicaemia/' as it
is now called. From this it was clear that he was " on
the wrong track " — he had discovered a hitherto un-
known disease germ, but not that of hydrophobia.
Without being discouraged, Pasteur continued his in-

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26 Louis Pasteur

vestigations, at no small risk to himself and his helpers,
as may be gathered from the description given by M.
Vallery-Radot of what used to take place. " One day,
Pasteur, wishing to obtain a little saliva direct from the
jaws of a rabid dog, two of Bourrel's assistants undertook
to drag a mad bulldog, foaming at the mouth, from its
cage ; they seized it with a lasso and stretched it on
the table. These two men, thus associated with Pasteur
in the same danger, with the same calm heroism held
the struggling, ferocious animal down with their powerful
hands, whilst the scientist, by means of a glass tube
held between his lips, drew a few drops of the deadly
saliva." They ran a terrible risk. It was all no use.
No satisfactory results could be obtained from the saliva.
Pasteur then tried the blood, but also in vain. As his
experience grew, he gradually became convinced that
the true seat of the virus lay in the central nervous
system. He tried inoculating with the medulla oblongata
(part of the brain) taken from a rabid animal, and
succeeded in reproducing the disease. At first the in-
jections were made under the skin. This method did
not yield uniform results, and so he tried placing the
virus directly on the brain. This was accomplished by
the operation called trephining, which means that the
animal was chloroformed, and a small round piece cut
out of its skull. The inoculation was then made directly
into the brain, the wound closed up, and the animal
allowed to recover. With constant practice this opera-
tion came to be performed with such speed and skill that
the animal, on regaining consciousness, seemed the same
as usual. But after the lapse of about a fortnight it
invariably developed hydrophobia and died. The seat
of the microbe had now been discovered. This was a
great step in advance. But it was followed by as great
a disappointment. The microscope revealed no bacillus.
The culture-flasks, abundantly inoculated with rabid
brain-matter, yielded no growth. The microbe could

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Louis Pasteur 27

not be found. (Now, after the lapse of thirty years,
we know why it was that Pasteur could not see this
microbe, or grow it.) Not being able to cultivate the
virus outside the body, Pasteur adopted the only means
open to him — he grew it in the brain of living rabbits,
transferring it from one that had just died to fresh animals.
He noticed that the time that elapsed between inoculation
and the outbreak of the symptoms gradually became
shorter, until it was at last reduced to seven days. Pas-
teur called this seven-day virus, virus fixe, because it
took a fixed time to produce the disease, instead of the
variable and inconstant periods taken by the virus
procured from ordinary mad dogs as captured in
the streets.

This important progress made, Pasteur began to see
his way to the final goal — that of immunization. Having
found out how to intensify the virus, he now sought for
a means of weakening it. The simplest possible plan
was that which he had learnt by accident in the case of
chicken-cholera, namely, the lapse of time. Accordingly
he took the spinal cords of rabbits that had just died of
virus fixe, suspended them by threads in flasks, the air
in which was kept dry by a lump of caustic potash lying
at the bottom, and kept them at a constant temperature
for days. At intervals he tried the effect of inocu-
lating rabbits with matter from these cords, and found
that after a fortnight in the flask all virulence was lost.
The shorter the period of drying, the greater the amount
of virulence that was retained. Accordingly, Pasteur
next proceeded to an immunization experiment. Into a
number of dogs he injected first of all some spinal cord
that had been kept a fortnight, next day some that had
been kept thirteen days, and so on till he was giving
them material from rabbits that had only died that very
day — the redoubtable virus fixe. The dogs so treated
remained well, and it was found that they could be bitten
by mad companions or even intra-cramally inoculated

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28 Louis Pasteur

without contracting the disease. They were absolutely
immune against hydrophobia. All this work was care-
fully watched by a scientific commission specially
appointed by the government for the purpose. A
place in the park of Villeneuve 1'Etang near St.
Cloud was set apart for the numerous experimental
animals with their kennels and cages. Pasteur was no
surgeon, and never operated with his own hands. The
difficult operations rendered necessary for these investi-
gations were at first performed by Dr. Roux, and later on
by skilled laboratory porters. During the years 1884
and 1885 the work went steadily on. The immediate
object was no longer to render a dog immune to rabies
before being bitten, but to prevent it from acquiring the
disease by treatment begun after it had been bitten or
otherwise inoculated with the virus. This was also
successfully accomplished. The path was now at last
opened straight to the ultimate goal — the rescue of a
human being from this most dreadful of diseases.

In July 1885 a suitable case presented itself in the per-
son of a little Alsatian peasant-boy, Joseph Meister, who,
on his way to school, had been knocked down and terribly
bitten by a furious dog, pronounced rabid by the veterin-
ary surgeon. The wounds (fourteen in number) had
not been cauterized till twelve hours afterwards, and then
only with carbolic acid. In the opinion of all, the poor
little fellow was doomed to the most agonizing of all
deaths. Pasteur felt and expressed the deepest anxiety
as to the advisability of trying his new method of im-
munization on a human being. He consulted the eminent
nerve specialist, Vulpian, who examined the boy himself
and decided, in conjunction with Dr. Grancher, one of
Pasteur's collaborators, that not a moment was to be
lost. They started, therefore, by injecting material
fourteen days old and quite devoid of virulence. The
little boy, who had been screaming with terror before-
hand, soon dried his tears on finding that he had only

208

Louis Pasteur 29

to suffer a slight pin prick. As days passed on, and Pasteur
found himself doing a thing never before done in the
history of the human race — deliberately administering
to an innocent child the virus of the most deadly of all
known diseases — his anxiety became terrible. He had
a series of sleepless nights. But there was no drawing
back now. Each day a number of fresh rabbits were
inoculated with the cords used for the boy, so as to test
their virulence. At last, on the twelfth day, he was
treated with the dreaded virus fixe. At the same time,
some of the same cord was given to a number of rabbits,
all of which developed hydrophobia on the seventh day.
The boy remained well. It was the surest test of the
successful immunity conferred on the patient. Pasteur
had conquered the terrors of hydrophobia !

When the news was spread, people who had been
bitten by rabid dogs began to pour in from all sides,
foreigners as well as Frenchmen. Doctors came also,
desirous of studying the method. The " service " of
hydrophobia became the principal business of the day.
Everything was done systematically. Names, dates
when bitten, history of the patient, and post-mortem
examination of the dog were all entered up, and patients
were carefully classified, so as to avoid any possibility
of receiving a wrong virus, which might prove fatal.
There was an occasional failure. A girl, aged ten, who
had been severely bitten on the head thirty-seven days
beforehand, was brought up. Pasteur looked on the case
as hopeless, on account of the time that had elapsed
since the bite, but allowed himself to be persuaded to
give the treatment. The child returned to school, but
shortly afterwards was seized with breathlessness and
convulsions. She could swallow nothing. Pasteur sat
by her deathbed, and as he went down the staircase,
burst into tears.

Despite occasional failures, which were mostly due to
the treatment having been begun too late, the success

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30 Louis Pasteur

of the Pasteur method was phenomenal. Out of his
first 350 patients only one succumbed, the little girl
just mentioned. The most reliable statistics up to the
introduction of the Pasteur treatment showed a mortality
of at least 16 per cent, from the bite of rabid dogs,
so that at least fifty-five lives had been saved from the
most agonizing of deaths. Pasteur concluded his paper
on the subject before the Academy of Medicine by the
suggestion that a vaccine establishment should be set
up for carrying on this important work, and others of
a cognate character, on a large scale. The project was
warmly applauded, money flowed in from all sides, and
the magnificent Institution called after Pasteur was
built, endowed, and equipped with every requirement
needed, not only for the work of hydrophobia, but for
researches on every variety of infectious disease, and
indeed on microbic life in general. Here his disciples
and fellow-workers, Roux, Duclaux, Grancher, Chamber-
land, Metchnikoff, and many others, found suitable
accommodation for the investigations that have thrown
so much light on the causation and prevention of disease.
The Institut Pasteur was formally opened on I4th
November 1888, the occasion being made a great public
function, at which our hero may be said to have attained
the pinnacle of glory.

His life-work was now accomplished. He entered the
Institute that bears his name, already ill and weary.
During the years that followed he supervised and
directed the labours of his colleagues, but did little
more original work himself.

The beginning of the end was in November 1894,
when he was seized with a uraemic attack. In broken
health he lingered on, tenderly watched over by his
wife, children, and grandchildren, till the following
September, and then he died. One of his hands rested
in that of Madame Pasteur, whilst the other held a
crucifix.

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Louis Pasteur 31

The Government decreed him a public funeral at
Notre Dame, where his body was temporarily laid to
rest. All that is mortal of him now reposes in a beauti-
ful mausoleum, erected at the Institute by his family.
The marble arches on either side of the sarcophagus
bear inscriptions recording his chief discoveries, whilst
beyond it is an apsidal chapel containing a white marble
altar. Above the staircase leading to the chapel are
inscribed the following words, taken from the oration
he delivered at his reception into the Academy of
Science : —

" Heureux celui qui porte en soi un dieu, un ideal de
beaut e, et qui lui obeit — ideal de 1'art, ideal de la science,
ideal de la patrie, ideal des vertus de 1'Evangile."

(Happy he who bears within himself a deity, an ideal
of beauty, and who obeys its dictates — an ideal of art,
an ideal of science, an ideal of patriotism, an ideal of
the virtues of the Gospel.)

Pasteur lived and died a devout Catholic, and in
erecting this beautiful monument to his memory, his
family took care that it should give expression to the
religious side of his nature. The mosaics with which
the tomb is decorated comprise angelic figures of Faith,
Hope, Charity, and Science. Above the altar we see
the descending figure of a dove representing the Holy
Spirit, and on either side the Greek letters A and D.

As a man of science, Pasteur claimed absolute liberty
of research ; but, unlike so many others who get carried
away by their speculations, he clung to the rock of
objectivity and never attempted to penetrate into
primary causes. Whilst, on occasion, making no secret
of his repugnance for insolent unbelief and barren irony,
he seldom gave expression in public to the ideals which
inspired his inner life. The following is one of the few
passages in which he alluded to those cherished beliefs
and hopes. It is taken from a speech on Spontaneous
Generation, delivered in 1874 at the Academy of Science :

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32 Louis Pasteur

" I must not be understood to imply that in my beliefs
and in the conduct of my life, I only take account of
acquired science ; even if I would, I could not do so,
for I should then have to strip myself of a part of my-
self. There are two men in each of us : the scientist —
he who starts with a clear field and desires to rise to
the knowledge of Nature, through observation, experi-
ment, and reasoning ; and the man of sentiment, the
man of belief, the man who mourns his dead children
and who cannot, alas ! prove that he will see them again,
but who believes that he will, and lives in that hope :
the man who will not die like a microbe, but who feels
that the force that is within him cannot die. The two
domains are distinct, and woe to him who tries to let
them trespass on each other in the so imperfect state of
human knowledge." In the words of his son-in-law,
M. Vallery-Radot : " With the spiritual sentiment which
caused him to claim for the inner moral life the same
liberty as for scientific research, he could not under-
stand certain givers of easy explanations, who affirm
that matter has organized itself, and who, considering
as perfectly simple the spectacle of the universe of which
the earth is but an infinitesimal part, are in no wise
moved by the Infinite Power who created the worlds.
With his whole heart he proclaimed the immortality of
the soul."

212

ALBERT DE LAPPARENT

(1839-1908)

BY THE REV. JOHN GERARD, S.J., F.L.S.

RECORDING the death of M. de Lapparent, our scientific
journal Nature wrote in terms which may fitly introduce
this sketch of his life and work 1 : —

" The loss sustained not only by geology but by
science at large by the death of so accomplished a writer
cannot at once be fully appreciated. ... By his death
the cause of science has been deprived of one of its most
strenuous and successful advocates. ... He was an
eminently religious man, and sacrificed not a little in
life for the sake of his convictions. No temptation
could induce him to abandon the Institut Catholique,
where from its foundation he continued to be one of
its pillars."

De Lapparent was the son of staunch Catholic parents,
his father being an officer of engineers, He was born at
Bruges, 3oth December 1839. As he afterwards had
occasion to remark, had his birth been two days later,
he would have had a twelvemonth more to qualify for
official exanimations. In his eighteenth year he gained
admission to the licole Polytechnique, commencing his
course as first on the list of candidates, and afterwards
concluding it in the same honourable position. On his
twenty-fifth birthday he was nominated inginieur de
deuxieme classe in the £cole des Mines, being specially
attached at the staff of Elie de Beaumont, whose instruc-

1 Nature, p. 33, I4th May 1908.
11 213 I

2 Albert de L apparent

tion he particularly esteemed. The master, on his side,
had not failed to notice so promising a pupil, who in 1868
was appointed his assistant in the geological survey of
France, being thus enabled to serve his apprenticeship
under such distinguished auspices in the dolomite district
of Southern Tyrol, one specially full of interest and
instruction. The memoir prepared on this occasion by
de Lapparent was recognized as exhibiting unusual
ability, being marked in particular by the precision and
lucidity always characteristic of him.

As a result, he was selected by Delesse to assist in pre-
paring the geological resume annually appearing in the
Annales des Mines, and summing up the latest advances
of the science, — a fortunate appointment, which made
him familiar with the results obtained at home and
abroad, and furnished him with abundant documentary
materials, which he was afterwards to find invaluable.
He was likewise able to learn from Delesse himself some-
thing of the talent for co-ordinating his various know-
ledge, for which he was distinguished.

De Lapparent was next employed in the observations
required in connection with the famous Channel tunnel,
which for some years was under serious consideration.
The question was whether there existed from shore to
shore a water-tight stratum in which to bore. That such
was found on either side of the strait there was no doubt,
and the observations of Hawkshaw and Brunei had
shown that this extended across the Channel, but the
question remained whether it was free from fissures,
faults, or dikes, which would suffice to ruin all by admit-
ting the flood. To determine this point, an exhaustive
series of soundings and borings were obviously required,
and the task was assigned to a commission of experts,
Lapparent being its secretary, and the details of its
operation being chiefly settled by him. For two seasons,
1875-1876, the work of the commission was diligently pro-
secuted— nearly 8000 soundings being taken (Hawkshaw

214

Albert de L apparent 3

had taken but 800), and the conclusion was reached that
there were no flaws in the stratum to mar its suitability
for the projected tunnel, the construction of which was
therefore quite feasible so far as physical conditions
went. For his share in this responsible and toilsome
work Lapparent was given the cross of the Legion of
Honour.

He was likewise engaged for some years in a geological
survey of the district of Bray in Normandy and Picardy,
the formation of which, according to de Beaumont,
seemed to be expressly designed to allow the nature of
the subsoil to be investigated. Here again de Lapparent
utilized his opportunities, not only for the accumulation
of professional knowledge, but likewise for the prepara-
tion of a memoir on the character of the district surveyed,
which at once took rank as a model of its kind.

Up to this point he had given proof of qualities which
seemed to promise a distinguished career as a practical
geologist, who by his own labour was likely to make
important additions to our knowledge of his favourite
science. He was destined, however, to do his best work
and win peculiar distinction in quite another way.

In 1875 he was offered and accepted the post of Pro-
fessor of Geology and Mineralogy in the Catholic Uni-
versity of Paris, then being organized, and was granted
unlimited leave of absence from his duties in connection
with the ficole des Mines. But, in 1880, when anti-
clericalism became militant, he was curtly informed that
he must decide between his official position as a state
engineer and that of professor in such a university. As
a staunch Catholic and strenuous upholder of educational
liberty, he did not hesitate to sacrifice what might have
appeared the best prospects of his life by refusing to
resign his chair ; and although it might have been thought
that he thus wrecked his whole career, the step proved
to be in reality a most fortunate one, no less for himself
personally than for the world at large. He was now at

215 i*

4 Albert de L apparent

full liberty to devote himself to a work which he had
already projected, which should exhibit the fullest and
most authentic results of geological knowledge brought
thoroughly up to date, and guaranteed by the best
authorities. For such a task he had exceptional quali-
fications. In the actual works in which he had been
engaged he had learned in practice how geology should
be studied, and its conclusions be reached. His share
in preparing the geological map of France had given him
detailed information as to the various formations of his
native land, while for fifteen years his co-operation in
the Revue de Geologic, conducted by Delesse, had supplied
him with a wealth of material from all quarters, as
valuable as it is hard to obtain. Moreover, he was
distinguished even amongst his countrymen for that
perspicuity and literary charm which are so marked and
admirable a characteristic of French scientific writing.

His first and most important publication was the
Traite de Geologie, which appeared in successive parts
between 1881 and 1883. This had at once a great
success, which was due partly to the manifest need of
such a work ; for hitherto there was no source from
which to draw geological information in France but
works which were antiquated and usually defective,
often translated from other tongues, and inspiring no
confidence. Still more effectually was the Traite recom-
mended by its own merits, which none could fail to
recognize, by its luminous presentation of every depart-
ment of science, its admirably logical arrangement, and
its characteristic elegance and limpidity of style. In
the space of 1200 pages the author contrived to distil the
substance of countless memoirs in all languages with a
fulness and clearness which left nothing to desire, so
that each of his chapters became an encyclopaedia of the
fullest and most recent advances of geological knowledge
in every branch, as, for example, with regard to micro-
scopic evidence lately obtained upon the constitution of

216

Albert de Lapparent 5

eruptive rocks. The first edition of 3000 copies was
speedily exhausted ; a second of 4400, appearing in
1885, was not only greatly improved and augmented,
but had its text carefully revised and edited. As in all
his works, the author's great object, as he declared, was
to make himself a faithful expositor of the actual state
of his science, and he never hesitated to abandon views
previously expressed if he thought that more recent
observation failed to corroborate them. The fifth edition,
in three volumes, with an aggregate of over two thousand
pages, which has taken its place as an indispensable
book of reference and suggestive guidance to every
student of modern geology, contained much additional
matter required by the advance of knowledge. For
since 1881 the area of the globe's surface to be dealt
with had been more than doubled, while travel and per-
sonal observation, and information gathered from ex-
perts at international congresses, had furnished abundant
material. Besides all this, a feature particularly notable
was the introduction in the text of numerous maps to
illustrate the geographical features of different regions
in successive geological periods, as to which we are told 1
that no one can peruse these restorations without a
sense of the enormous amount of geological literature
which had been laid under contribution, and that, al-
though they could only be tentative, the data being
often meagre and not always trustworthy, they are
replete with interest and suggestion.

Besides the great work of which we have spoken, de
Lapparent produced a Compendium of Geology, designed
principally for beginners, but proving of great utility
to teachers as well as pupils.

Having found it necessary as professor to turn his
attention to mineralogy, a subject in which, as he him-
self declared, he found unexpected interest, and even
fascination, he produced a treatise on this subject ex-

1 Nature ', l.c.
217

6 Albert de Lapparent

hibiting qualities like those of his geology, and attaining
a similar popularity, especially abroad : it reached a
fourth edition in 1908, the year of the author's death.
He likewise did much to promote the study of physical
geography, so closely connected with geology ; and,
amongst other contributions to this subject, produced
his G&ologie en Chemin-de-fer, giving an account of the
various formations through which the railway had to
pass within the Paris basin, and the features presented
by the different soils so traversed. All these works, dis-
tinguished alike by lucidity of arrangement and elegance
of expression, have proved, we are assured,1 of the great-
est service in furthering the progress of science in its
several branches and the general advance of education.

In 1907 he received the high distinction of being
appointed Permanent Secretary to the Academic des
Sciences in succession to M. Berthelot.

Being thus in continual touch with the views of geolo-
gists in all parts of the world, it was inevitable that de
Lapparent should be confronted by the questions which
the study of this science necessarily raises, and which,
as we are often told, make it more than any other im-
possible to reconcile with Christian belief. From the
history of his life it is evident that his own faith was
nowise impaired by such studies ; and, moreover, he
constantly employed both tongue and pen in defence of
what he held to be the cause of truth, both in numerous
magazine articles and in addresses to Catholic scientific
congresses in various regions. Some of his contributions
have been issued separately, and furnish material well
worthy the attention of all who have occasion to discuss
such subjects.2 Profoundly assured that all truth is
from God, whether religious or scientific, and that there
can therefore be no real contradiction between its lessons,

1 Nature, I.e.

2 See Science et Apologttique> 4th ed., 1910, and La Philosophic
mintrale. 1910.

218

Albert de Lapparent 7

he was quite undisturbed by the difficulties which some
find so formidable, and he was always confident that with
fuller knowledge they would be dissipated ; nor would
he ever consent to attempt by forced interpretations to
seek a reconciliation between the Scripture narrative of
Creation and the geological records. Neither had he any
sympathy with those who, regarding science with sus-
picion and hostility, sought to belittle its conclusions by
pointing to cases in which the haste of some extreme
partisans to find matter for theories adverse to Christian-
ity had betrayed them into manifest error. Thus, after
discussing the case of what are described as eoliths,
stones declared by some to be articles of human manu-
facture, which would extend the period of man's presence
on earth not merely by hundreds but by thousands of
centuries, after contending at length that their artificial
character is inadmissible, and is supported by arguments
in which fancy plays a predominant part, when the dis-
cussion had wound up with the account of what, in his
own opinion and that of other experts, proves to demon-
stration that objects precisely similar to the supposed
eoliths can be formed in a purely mechanical manner,
without the introduction of any intentional element,
Lapparent thus goes on * : —

" To find fault with the extravagances of which some
men of science may be guilty is not to attack science
herself, and the detection of such mistakes does not by
any means justify us in assuming an attitude of suspicion
in regard of an edifice whereof some portions may be
defective without at all impairing the efficiency of the
rest. When we narrated the diverting experiences of
the eoliths, there were not wanting some who, taking
note of this exposure, jumped hastily to the conclusion
that the history of all chipped flints without exception
was to be treated as fabulous. Nothing is further from
our thoughts ; we feel bound to repeat once again that

1 Philosophic mintrale, p. 311.
2I9

8 Albert de Lapparent

in writing the foregoing pages our object was not in any
way to cast discredit on prehistoric archaeology. On the
contrary, we gladly acknowledge that it has in truth done
wonders, and enriched our minds with a long series of
particulars as full of interest as they were before un-
suspected. Our only object has been a desire to put
right-minded men on their guard against the proceedings
of a school which, notoriously influenced by anti-religious
zeal, has manifested far too great readiness in admitting
what has never been actually proved, a school all the less
entitled to adopt such a course that its representatives
are for ever declaiming of scientific methods and ' positive
facts/ "

From this attitude de Lapparent never departed, ever
maintaining that science, if genuinely scientific, is entitled
to honour and respect, and that its results must be
loyally and ungrudgingly accepted. He thus treats
the great question which in our day more than in any
other has exercised the minds of men * : —

" The Christian apologist should be well-informed, not
that he is bound to have complete acquaintance with all
the various sciences, which would entail superhuman
labour, but it is imperative that he should keep himself
abreast of the results achieved in each department, and
not be guilty of the error of employing inadequate
weapons drawn from antiquated sources, or from in-
formation supplied by the hasty perusal of popular
works possessing no authority.

" In this connection we will specify the results of a
science whereof a century ago there was no inkling, but
which for the future must remain as established beyond
all contradiction, and has now acquired enormous de-
velopments, namely, geology. Unquestionably there
still remains much about it which we do not know, and
in each of its chapters differences arise amongst specialists
which occasionally lead to lively controversy. Never-

1 Science et Apologttique> c. vii.
220

Albert de Lapparent 9

theless, the main lines of the doctrinal system become
better established every day, and in regard of some
questions that unanimity has been attained which is the
guarantee of empirical certitude.

" Amongst these is the great antiquity of the globe.
It will doubtless be long before we can fully estimate
the period required, but that, for the whole process of
formation, it must be reckoned in millions of years there
can be no question.

" Neither can we fail to recognize on the surface of
the land and in the seas the constantly recurring succes-
sion of organisms which differ more widely from those
now existing in proportion as their antiquity is greater.
Nor will any competent geologist of the present day
suppose that these various generations of diverse animals
and plants have disappeared under the action of violent
catastrophes.

" Here the geologist appears to give valuable evidence
on the subject of evolution, which is so much discussed
and yet remains so obscure. Since the different forms
occur in regular succession, and intermediate types are
never wanting, while their variations are ever in accord
with the difference of their ages, it is very difficult to
avoid the idea of an evolution, regulated like all else
here below, and under the control of a potent cause
beyond Nature, according to a determined design. Of
course, geology can never supply a direct proof of this,
since it is acquainted only with fossil remains, and has
not the opportunity of exhibiting Nature at work. Still,
the impression resulting from consideration of the realm
of palaeontology seems impossible to reconcile with any
other system. Therefore, without at all pretending that
the question is finally determined, and fully acknowledg-
ing that as yet the machinery of the transformation is
wholly beyond us, we are of opinion that the apologist
would be ill-advised who should assume, in regard to the
principle of evolution, the combative and irreconcilable

221

io Albert de Lapparent

attitude which it has frequently been thought necessary
to adopt."

A further observation may be commended to some
controversialists : —

" May we likewise be allowed to indicate another duty
to which the apologist is specially bound if he desires
his work to bear fruit, that, namely, of imbuing himself
with that tranquillity which should always dominate
scientific work, and with which it is not well to dispense,
even under plea of giving free scope to legitimate indig-
nation. Sound reasons do not require to be expressed
in violent terms, and conclusive arguments gain nothing
by an exhibition of temper or petulance."

While he did not shrink from criticizing the methods
sometimes adopted by champions of orthodoxy, it need
not be said that he never hesitated to express his opinion
that their opponents frequently represented as scientifically
established that which was in truth recommended by its
accordance with their own doctrines rather than by more
solid reasons, and which lost instead of gaining ground
as knowledge advanced. So, as to the vexed question of
the antiquity of our race, in which he took particular
interest, treating it on several occasions from various
points of view, he thus expressed himself 1 : —

" What we have endeavoured to make clear is that
positive science, the better she is informed, and the more
independent she is of prepossessions, that science which
is in no hurry to come to conclusions, and demands ex-
clusive proofs, tends to discredit rather than to corro-
borate the larger estimates of time which many delighted
in representing as final. Whether the question be of
eoliths, of fossil men, or of the date of the palaeolithic
centres, we find that the most trustworthy observations
agree in assigning a later, not an earlier, date to the
first authentic indication of human activity. The moral
to be gathered is a decisive enforcement of that caution

1 Philosophic mintrale, p. 313.
222

Albert de Lapparent 1 1

which is too easily forgotten, but of which true men of
science should never be unmindful."

In many ways de Lapparent showed himself a remark-
able man, who gained general regard. As testified by
the obituary notice already cited, there was something
in him eminently attractive ; his gentle and kindly
manner drew to him men of all nationalities, and his
charm as a speaker led to his being continually in request
to deliver public addresses, in which the well-modulated
voice, the felicitous choice of words, and the flashes of
humour, made his speeches delightful to listen to, while,
under playfulness of speech, public and private alike, he
would from time to time reveal the depths of his serious
nature. He spoke and wrote German with facility, and
at Berlin in 1899 and Munich in 1900 addressed scientific
congresses in that language.

As for the Institut Catholique, for whose sake, as we
have seen, he was ready to make such serious sacrifices,
how seriously he took his obligation in its regard was
evidenced when he showed himself prepared to traverse
the whole extent of Paris in order to give instruction to
a single pupil.

When, in 1894, to commemorate the centenary of the
Polytechnic School, a series of celebrations were arranged,
from which everything of a religious character was
entirely eliminated, some of its former members deter-
mined to do what they could to supply the deficiency ;
and though he disclaimed the credit of originating such
a project, it was undoubtedly to de Lapparent's co-
operation and energy that its striking success was due.
Not only did a numerous company assemble to cherish
the memory of their old comrades, but the Mass then
inaugurated has become an annual institution, which
brings together considerable numbers, and has elicited
demonstrations of sympathy even from non-Catholics,
who still believe in the immortality of man.

While he was unmatched in the work of popularizing
223

1 2 Albert de L apparent

science in the interest of religion, there was nothing in
de Lapparent's pages of the arid and prosaic character
which seems so often to be induced by studies like his.
He knew how to make science attractive and intelligible
to educated minds without derogating in any degree from
accuracy ; and in his apologetic work it may be said that
every page is illumined by evidence of the power and
wisdom to which the world owes its being.

But, except in rare and peculiar cases, he did not, when
dealing with questions properly scientific, make explicit
mention of the supreme intelligence to whose control
Nature bears witness. He left facts to speak for them-
selves, and was satisfied with making plain the great
notes of order which stamps Nature as, beyond question,
the handiwork of God.

When, however, he had the opportunity of rendering
a service to the cause of religion and of science, he never
failed to exert his voice and pen on their behalf, employing
both again and again, in international scientific congresses,
and others of many kinds, in homely popular lectures for
the benefit of unlearned folk, in articles contributed to
reviews and magazines, and in conferences at his own
Institut Catholique.1 So hard did he work, up to the
very end, as to make him humorously wonder how it was
that eyes were still left him and he had escaped writers'
cramp.

To him might assuredly be applied what he said of
L. de Bussy in 1904, that the lives of some men furnish
sermons more eloquent than those of the best preachers.

1 J. Muthuon in the £tudes, 2oth July 1908.

224

THOMAS DWIGHT

(1843-1911)

SIR BERTRAM WINDLE, M.D., Sc.D., F.R.S., etc.

THE visitor to Stratford-on-Avon, when passing down
High Street, has his attention diverted from the other-
wise all-absorbing presence of Shakespeare by a fine
specimen of a sixteenth-century house with elaborately
carved barge-boards known as " The Harvard House."
This house was built by Alderman Thomas Rogers in
the year 1596. His daughter Catherine married John
Harvard. Their son, also a John, graduated at Emman-
uel College, Cambridge, in 1635, took Anglican Orders,
went to New England and died, whilst still quite a
young man, in 1638, bequeathing to a College in New
England, which it was then proposed to erect, his
library consisting of over three hundred volumes
and a sum of £779. The College, when founded, was
given his name and is now the well-known Harvard
College, situated at Cambridge, near Boston, the oldest
and perhaps the most celebrated seat of learning in
the United States.

12 22 5 i

2 Thomas Dwight

The Chair of Anatomy in the School of Medicine con-
nected with this College was founded in 1782, and its
first occupant was one John Warren, whose brother,
General Warren, was killed at the battle of Bunkers Hill.
John Warren was succeeded in the Professorship of
Anatomy by his son John Collins Warren, who in turn
gave place to Oliver Wendell Holmes, a name more
distinguished in literature than in science. Holmes in
his turn was succeeded by Dr. Thomas Dwight, the
subject of this paper, who was a grandson of John
Collins Warren, and consequently the great-grandson
of John Warren, the founder of the Medical School at
Harvard.

Thomas Dwight was born in Boston on October 13,
1843. His father, also a Thomas Dwight, was the repre-
sentative of the seventh generation of that family in
New England. Thomas Dwight, senior, graduated in
Harvard in 1827 and died in 1876, having been received
into the Catholic Church during his last illness. His
wife was the daughter of Professor John Collins Warren,
the founder, as will shortly be shown, of the Warren
Museum, and a man of strong religious feeling. This
was shown by the fact that when in 1820 the religious
body to which he belonged began to turn itself in the
direction of Unitarianism, Dr. Warren refused to follow,
and with a few friends established St. Paul's Church.
" It took courage," says the account which I am quoting
from Dr. Harrington's address to the members of the
guild of St. Luke's, Boston, " to disagree openly with
what practically amounted to the State religion at that
period." The same writer points out that in 1855
" strong courage of religious feeling, to say the least, was
required for a non-Catholic to embrace the Catholic faith
in Boston." Yet it was at this time that Dr. Warren's
two daughters, Mrs. Charles Lyman and Mrs. Thomas

226

Thomas Dwight 3

Dwight, became Catholics. At the same time, Mrs.
Dwight's son, Thomas, the subject of this paper, was also
received into the Church, being then aged thirteen. In
his Thoughts of a Catholic Anatomist, Professor Dwight
refers no doubt to some extent to this event when he says
" It is now the fashion, in a certain set, to declare that
religion is an emotion. Nothing could be more fantasti-
cally absurd nor more untrue. . . . When a man con-
siders deliberately whether he will accept the doctrines of
the Catholic Church, and having prayed for guidance in
making his decision and for strength to stick to it when
made, he may or may not experience an emotion (pro-
bably he will experience a great emotion), but his action
is not the result of emotion ; on the contrary, it is the
cause of the emotion. Suppose he remains true to his
religion through great trials, from which he could free
himself by being false to his convictions, have we any
right to say that this is emotion ? There are plenty of in-
stances of men and women persevering faithfully for long
years in austere orders, in which the life is of the hardest,
without the support, the sensible fervour which is granted
to some. They went on when all was hard, pleasureless,
nay, repulsive. Was Father Damien's long work among
the lepers the result of emotion ? That religion may
awaken emotion is most true, just as exercise may awaken
appetite, but the emotion is no more the religion than the
appetite is the exercise. ... In point of fact, it is hard
to see how any thinking person can seriously support
this view."

Thomas Dwight, junior, was educated at a private
school, and entered Harvard in 1866. Possibly his
medical ancestry on his mother's side turned the young
man's attention to that profession. Be that as it may,
Dwight graduated as a medical man and shortly turned
his attention to the scientific side of his profession, his
first essay in that direction having been a study of the

227

4 Thomas Dwight

subject of intracranial circulation, then a matter of great
medical controversy, for which he was awarded first prize
by the Boylston Medical Society in 1867. In order to
improve his knowledge the young doctor spent two years
in study at Vienna and Berlin, and subsequently went to
Munich, where he worked under Riidinger, the originator
of the frozen-section method which threw such a flood
of light upon topographical anatomy. On returning to
America, Dwight was appointed Professor of Anatomy at
Bowdoin College, where he introduced the frozen-section
method for the first time in America. During his occu-
pancy of this position he was called upon to give evidence
as to identification of bones in a celebrated murder trial.
Dr. Dwight's evidence was regarded as of the highest
importance, and the study of the subject which he then
made led to the production of his work on The Identifica-
tion of the Human Skeleton.

In 1872 Dr. Dwight was appointed instructor in Com-
parative Anatomy at Harvard, and, after holding several
other comparatively minor posts, was, in 1883, elected
Parkman Professor of Anatomy in the room of Oliver
Wendell Holmes, who had occupied that position for
thirty-five years. Holmes was essentially a popular
lecturer. He is known to the world as the writer of
delightful literature, and most prominently as the " Auto-
crat of the Breakfast Table." But so far as I am aware,
he is quite unknown to the scientific world by any con-
tributions to the literature of anatomy. Dwight, on the
contrary, set himself to the task of treating anatomy as a
science, especially a statistical science, and, above all
things, as the basis and foundation of medical teaching
and practice. " For practically the first time in the
history of the school," says Dr. Harrington, " original
work was undertaken by students and teachers. Anatomy
became a science ; dissection an art. Most minute
statistical observation of the variations of structure,

228

Thomas Dwight 5

number, and arrangement of bones, organs, and tissue
were collected and collaborated. The course of anatomy
was systematized so that the first-year students were
taught descriptive anatomy, while lectures and exercises
on topographical anatomy were confined to the more
advanced classes." As will be seen later, Dr. Dwight
held the Chair of Anatomy until the time of his death
in 1911.

It is more than a little difficult to give to the non-
scientific reader any clear idea of the services to science
of a man occupying a position such as that held by Profes-
sor Dwight. It has aptly been observed by someone that
a man may hold the highest possible position amongst
his scientific compeers without his name being known in
any way to the general public. This is perhaps essenti-
ally the case with an anatomist who, at the present day,
is not in the way of making those startling discoveries
which render such names as those of Lister, Pasteur, or
Rontgen household words. Nevertheless, such a man
may contribute, as Dwight did, in various ways and in
large measure to the advancement of knowledge. In
this connection allusion may first be made to his relation
to the Warren Museum. This museum had been started
in 1799 by his grandfather, Dr. John Collins Warren. It
must have been therefore in every way a congenial task
to Dwight to devote himself to its arrangement and
classification. This task to which he set himself on his
appointment to the Chair of Anatomy was continued up to
the time of his death ; his contributions to the collection
were constant and numerous, and this great museum will
always remain a monument of his patient and careful
organizing capacity. Before passing away from this
collection it should be stated that it contains an extra-
ordinary variety of normal and morbid specimens,
amongst which is the famous " crowbar skull," a puzzle
psychologically no less than surgically. It came from a

229 i*

6 Thomas Dwight

man through whose head a tamping iron was completely
driven by the premature explosion of a blast. He lived
for thirteen years afterwards with the loss of one eye,
but with unimpaired intellect. Much of the anterior
part of the left frontal lobe of the brain must have been
destroyed, yet his speech and memory for words were
not affected.

Dwight's public work mainly dealt with the subject
of variation and particularly with variation as related to
the skeleton, and more especially to the spine, hands
and feet. For years he was engaged in making a very
valuable collection of human spines showing practically
all possible numerical variations of the ribs and of
the vertebrae in different regions, and of fusions be-
tween different parts. The results of these researches
appeared in a memoir of the Boston Society of Natural
History and in contributions to other anatomical
journals. He also studied and described the abnor-
malities at the top of the spine which might cause mal-
positions of the head and face. After completing his
studies on variations of the spine, he devoted himself to
the same subject in the hand and foot, and succeeded in
obtaining a remarkable series of specimens showing the
chief variations in the carpus and tarsus, and including
several unique cases of variations in these regions. He
was the first to find and describe the subcapitatum as a
separate and distinct element in both hands. This was
especially satisfactory to him, as Pfitzner had described
the possibility of the separate existence of this element,
but had never seen a case of it. In the foot he found two
cases of an absolutely new element, the intercuneiform
bone, which had never before been observed, and also two
instances of the secondary cuboid bone. The first of
these occurred in one foot, and only one previous case
had been seen by Schwalbe. The other occurred in both
feet and was a unique case. In 1907 Dr. Dwight

230

Thomas Dwight 7

published an atlas on the variations of the bones of the
hand and foot, based on the specimens in his collection
and on X-rays. This careful and detailed work on
variations naturally gave great weight to his opinion on
the. present day controversy as to the relative values of
small variations and greater changes, or, as they are now
called, " mutations," in the process of Organic Evolution.
He gave one of the six addresses on this subject before
the American Society of Naturalists at Philadelphia in
1905. In this address he commences by pointing out the
essential difference between Darwin's idea and the idea
of de Vries. " A radical difference," he says, " between
the two theories is this : Darwinism pure and simple is
essentially fortuitous ; it aims in no particular direction,
there is no goal ; while mutation by producing suddenly
a new species, or at least a subspecies, implies the exist-
ence of a type and of a law which under certain conditions
becomes operative." Further he proceeds, " The theory
of change by minute variations receives no support from
anatomical observations. Precisely what many thought
an illustration of Darwinism is its refutation. Huxley
foresaw this when he doubted whether variations might
not prove a two-edged sword. The fundamental error
into which supporters of evolution by selection are
logically driven is the unwarranted assumption that
similarity of structure can be explained only by descent.
Though not formally stated, this is tacitly accepted almost
as an axiom." And he concludes, "It is to my mind
impossible to find any support for a theory of evolu-
tion by minute changes from the study of anatomical
variations. I should not venture to say, on the other
hand, that they give any direct support to the theory
of mutation ; but at least they are not in disaccord
with it."

It would be tedious and indeed useless in a popular
account such as this to deal particularly with Professor

231

8 Thomas Dwight

Dwight's scientific communications. Suffice it to say
that to the account of his life given in the Anatomical
Record is added a bibliography of his writings, the items
in which amount to seventy-six in number. It may be
added as proof of the value of his work that Dwight's
colleagues in science gave to him the highest position
in their power when they made him President of the
American Anatomical Association.

In addition to these mostly purely professional publi-
cations mention must be made of Dr. Dwight's writings
of a Catholic or of what is called an " apologetic "
character, amongst which by far the most important is
his Thoughts of a Catholic Anatomist, which might
almost be described as a posthumous work, since it ap-
peared when its author was on his death-bed. To this
work further attention will be paid in a later part of this
essay, but before dealing with it it will be necessary to
say something about Dr. Dwight's position as a Catholic ;
and in dealing with this aspect of his life, I must of
necessity largely draw upon the information supplied
to me by the series of addresses delivered before the
members of the Guild of St. Luke at Boston, a guild of
which, by the appointment of Cardinal O'Connell, the
subject of this biography had been constituted the first
President.

Dr. Dwight, as I have already mentioned, was re-
ceived into the Catholic Church in his thirteenth year,
and of that Church he remained a fervent and attached
member during his life. Those who read his works will
gather that he was not only a devout Catholic, but will see
that he was also an instructed Catholic ; he was a deep
student of the works of St. Thomas Aquinas, and fully
appreciated the overwhelming claims on the attention of
intellectual men and women which our Church, in addition
to a thousand other reasons for our affection, possesses
in such a remarkable manner.

232

Thomas D wight 9

That this attachment to his Church was not a secret
possession, but that his faith was as a city set upon a hill
to be seen of all men, is abundantly clear and is indeed
admitted by the writer of his biography in the Anatomical
Record, of course a purely scientific periodical, when he
says, " His deep religious feeling and his devotion and
loyalty to his faith were his strongest characteristics and
influenced to a great degree his opinions and his scientific
point of view."

" I would rather be thought a bigot than to be too lax,"
was a favourite and characteristic remark of his, and it is
recorded of him that when a newspaper, hoping no doubt
to say something which would please the Professor,
described him as a " Liberal Catholic," he wrote to its
editor to say that he knew of nothing which he had
ever said or done which would render such an epithet
justifiable.

With these introductory remarks I may now pass to
the series of addresses of which I have already spoken.
They are four in number, and were delivered by medical
men of Boston who considered various aspects of their
late President's character, especially, of course, in its
relation to the Catholic faith. No sketch of Dr. Dwight,
says Dr. Harrington, can touch the secret of his strength
nor understand his actions without a consideration of his
intense Catholic faith. In fact, his ardent Catholic faith
was his life. It gave outward expression to the intense
spiritual nature which permeated his whole inner self.
That he was often misunderstood and frequently mis-
judged by those who could not appreciate such a char-
acter, is not surprising. That a religious faith such as he
possessed and manifested should invite bigotry, opposi-
tion, and at times persecution, few realised better than he.
If any of these poisonous arrows ever caused him the
least personal anguish or pain, no one ever knew it. The
beauty of it all is that he was so unconscious of the moral

233

io Thomas D wight

courage he so constantly practised. Militant Catholicism
was as real to him as militant patriotism was to his
Warren ancestors. There could be no compromise on
either. This spirit gave to everything he did — religious,
professional, and lay — a life and colouring far outside the
ordinary. Hating sham, despising hypocrisy, and shun-
ning notoriety, he never tolerated any of these from
those associated with him, nor from those claiming to
speak with authority. Possessing the honest scepticism
of the real scientist, he was at the same time a most rigid
disciplinarian, once authority was established. In the
many perplexities into which this principle often carried
him, he always found strength in the wise, conservative
authority of the Church as expressed by the Council of
the Vatican : " Nulla unquam inter fidem et rationem
vera dissentia esse potest " (Never can there be a real
conflict between faith and reason). It would have been
quite unnatural if a nature so deeply religious, and one
so ardent and militant in its Catholicism, remained silent
when the tenets of that religion were attacked or neglected.
Such occasions, happily less frequent to-day, never
found Dr. Dwight timid, unwilling, or unjust. He was
ready to grant to others the right he demanded for those
whose cause he championed. He would accept no less
than justice and the law guaranteed. As the sole re-
presentative often of the Catholic faith on State boards,
he fought valiantly and successfully for the parental and
religious rights of those wards committed to the State's
care ; as a Catholic citizen, he protested against State
interference in the choice of education by parents for
their children ; as trustee of the Boston City Library, he
fought the proscription of Catholic authors, as well as
the introduction there of blasphemous, debasing, anti-
Catholic literature. Numerous instances might be
recalled where Dr. Dwight publicly righted popular
prejudice and misconception on the position of the

234

Thomas Dwight 1 1

Catholic Church in science, in works of charity, and in
federation. One occasion deserves special mention. It
was the Faneuil Hall meeting in 1907, protesting against
the injustice of the French Government towards the
Catholic Church. His oration on that occasion, we are
told by those who heard it, recalled those stirring, vigor-
ous, patriotic addresses of his colonial ancestor, John
Warren.

A further example of this desire to put matters right
when the Catholic Church had been attacked may be
found in the incident which led to the publication of his
paper Commonplaces of History, which was called into
existence as a reply to an essay which had been contri-
buted by a gentleman to a social club in Boston on the
subject of the Spanish discovery of America. This
paper incidentally pointed out, according to Dr. Dwight's
summary, "that there was no redeeming feature in
Spanish rule in America ; that the Catholic Church was
responsible for the evils ; that the treasures of the New
World, by enriching Spain, enabled it to carry on for so
long the bloody wars of the Netherlands ; that they thus
supported throughout Europe the Catholic cause against
the Protestant, the former of which stood for oppression
and abomination of all kinds, while the latter represented
civil and religious liberty. Finally, that we in America
are indebted for those blessings to our Puritan fore-
fathers."

These accusations Dr. Dwight set himself to confute,
and it is pleasant to be able to relate that the person who
suggested that he should prepare his essay in reply was
the author of the original attack. Dr. Dwight narrows
down the controversy to the following points. " Is the
Catholic Church to be held accountable for the misdeeds
of those who were her children but in name, and have we
to thank the Reformation for civilization, for freedom
from tyranny, and for liberty of conscience ? " It is

235

12 Thomas Dwight

not possible to follow here his enlargement of the thesis
laid down, but it is of an exhaustive and convincing
character and an excellent example of the late
Professor's method of handling facts and of standing
forth as the Champion of the Church when she was
attacked.

Dr. Dwight was an active supporter of the Society of
St. Vincent de Paul, and, oddly enough, it was through
this that I first became acquainted with the fact that he
was a fellow-Catholic. Dr. Dwight's chief work, as I
have already shown, was largely in connection with the
subject of variation, and that was a subject to which I
also at one time directed a good deal of attention, and in
connection with which I published a number of papers
and abstracts. These communications I was in the habit
of sending to Dr. Dwight, as a fellow-worker, and from
him at various times I received in exchange copies of his
writings. Amongst these, on one occasion, arrived the
Annual Report of the Boston S. V. P., with the " Com-
pliments of Thomas Dwight." To my great surprise I
then discovered that my friendly correspondent of a
number of years was a brother in the faith, and our
communications for the future became less entirely of a
scientific character than they had been heretofore.
Amongst other papers which I received from him was a
card printed and distributed by himself in honour of the
silver jubilee of the Archbishop of Boston, on one side of
which was St. Thomas Aquinas's prayer, " Creator
ineffabilis," which might well be the prayer of every
man of science.

But to turn to Dwight's work as a Brother of St.
Vincent de Paul; and here again I must derive my
information from the addresses of those who worked with
him and knew him personally as it was never my good
fortune to do.

Dr. Dwight was for many years a Brother of the

236

Thomas D wight 13

Society of St. Vincent de Paul, and for a considerable
time occupied the post of President of the Central and
Particular Councils, a position which he accepted, though
with many regrets that it should have deprived him of
that personal satisfaction he had experienced when
a conference visitor to the poor. He was in the habit of
frequently referring to the gratification which these
visits gave to him, and he used especially to indicate the
pleasure which he derived from the visit on Christmas
Eve, " when the members assembled at Mr. Williams's
store and each man received his basket for delivery to
the widowed, the orphaned, or the sick."

He was also constant in his endeavours to obtain new
Brothers, and one of his recruits, who was also one of his
students, in delivering one of the addresses to which I
have so frequently alluded, gave an account of the way
in which he came to be enlisted in the Brotherhood.
When a medical student, he tells us, Dr. Dwight suggested
to him that he should join the Society. " Several inter-
views with him," continues Dr. Leen, the Brother in
question, " showed me that the sanctification of one's own
soul was the only reward of membership. He pointed out
that though I might be a busy medical student, the work
under ordinary circumstances did not require much time,
and that, except in the matter of meetings, one can gener-
ally choose his own hours. He argued that students and
professional men have the time, for most of us find time
to do what we want to do. It was particularly regretted
that of the many young Catholics of superior education
so very few seemed called upon to join the Society, in
contradistinction to the non-Catholic benevolent societies
which contained among their members so many of the
best minds of the community. There was constantly
in his mind the loss those not members suffered, for he
would say one can bring nothing to the Society of St.
Vincent de Paul that bears any comparison to what he

237

14 Thomas Dwight

receives from it ; and there was nothing which gave him
greater pleasure than to welcome young men to its ranks
where they could devote the fruits of their education
and talents to the honour of God by serving his poor."
But the late Professor's opinion as to the Society may be
better learnt, perhaps, from his own words than from
those even of his warmest admirers. At a general
meeting of the Society he laid before the Brothers his
own idea of the Society in words which may well bear
quotation here. " If our Society should cease to exist/'
he said, "there would at first be a great void; new
machinery would have to be provided to maintain the
poor, and very large sums of money would be needed ;
but I have but little doubt that after a certain time the
physical needs of the poor would be fairly well provided
for by others, so that the superficial observer without the
insight of faith would see no great loss. He would not
know of the family here and there which has been brought
to a good life, of the dying sinner who has received
the sacraments, of the children whose faith had been
saved, of the prisoners who had been visited, of the
self-denial of the member who had done his work at
great inconvenience, of the good examples given of
the graces and indulgences gained. This is the super-
natural side of our work which makes it truly worth
the doing.''

One other piece of religious work in which Dr. Dwight
delighted must not pass unnoticed. This was the Society
of the Nocturnal Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament,
which was established by himself at the Boston Cathedral
in 1882. He and a small band of associates met on the
eve of the first Friday of each month and on the opening
of a Forty Hours' Adoration. Each member in turn
kept his vigil before the Blessed Sacrament during the
exposition, and all received Communion at the Mass.
Cots were provided in the vestry for those members

238

Thomas Dwight 15

awaiting their hours during the night of sacred sentinel
duty. This practice he continued until his failing health
made such a service unwise.

This failing health was first made known to me in a
letter which gave me a great shock, for at the time I
received it I had no idea that the Professor was not in
full vigour. I had written to him on behalf of a young
friend and former pupil, then taking out a post-graduate
course in Harvard University, and his letter in reply
began with some remarks on this matter. It is dated
April 20, 1910, and the portion of it which I am about
to transcribe relates to his last illness. He says, " I
enjoyed very much meeting Professor Macalister1 last
June. We had a grand time with my variations. It is
not often that I can show them to one who knows.
Cunningham 2 was then at the point of death, and Mac-
alister told me that he had cancer. It seemed to me that
the thought (in substance) passed through my mind,
' hodie tibi, eras mihi.' Then I had only suspicions
about myself ; now I know. It is, however, a slow-
growing affair, so they tell me. I have done a good deal
of work this season and hope to be able to stand it one
season more. The Harvard authorities have behaved
far more than handsomely. Perhaps you will pray for
me sometimes."

The courage and resignation to God's will shown in
this letter were exemplified during the remainder of his
life. The Anatomical Record, in the obituary from which
I have already quoted, says, " The last two years of his
life were passed under the handicap of an incurable
disease, in spite of which he gave two full courses of
lectures and added several monographs to his work on
the skeleton. ... He always looked forward to meeting

1 Alexander Macalister, F.R.S., then and now Professor of Anatomy
in the University of Cambridge.

2 D. J. Cunningham, F.R.S., then Professor of Anatomy in the
University of Edinburgh.

239

1 6 Thomas Dwight

his classes at the first exercise in their medical career,
and, although in the summer he knew that he was failing,
still hoped to meet this year's class at least once in the
fall. This opportunity was denied him, and his death
occurred three weeks before the opening of the term.
To all who had the privilege of being associated with
Professor Dwight in the Department of Anatomy, his
courage in persisting in his work while suffering great
discomfort, and at times much pain, was a most inspiring
example. His ability and determination to show no
sign of weakness enabled him to make the best possible
use of the short time that was left to him. It gave him
the satisfaction of continuing his work as a lecturer as
well as his contributions to anatomical science to the very
last, and was a worthy climax to his long and laborious
career."

From another point of view, that of his religious
associates, this picture of his last days drawn by one who
had been his anatomical colleague may be completed.
The obituary notice in America says : " There could be
no finer summing up of such a life as Dr. Dwight's than
the record of the two last years. Just two years ago he
knew that he was attacked by a fatal disease. He
accepted it, not only with calmness and courage, but with
abundant cheerfulness, and wished that no secret should
be made about it. He kept on with all the work for which
his strength sufficed, and he often said that his health
was so much more than it was reasonable to expect, that
it must be supernatural — a direct answer to prayers.
He was an object lesson to all, and called forth admira-
tion from Protestants as well as Catholics, some of the
former saying that if the Catholic religion could make a
man and all his family receive affliction in such a spirit,
it was a faith that all must reverence. Though failing
all summer, at times he could rally enough to say, ' I
think there is a fighting chance that I may give my lec-

240

Thomas Dwight 17

tures again next winter/ Those he gave last winter
were up to his highest average. But those near him
knew that there was no ' fighting chance ' left for him
in this world. The whole community at Nahant was
' as one family/ it was said, as this truly consecrated
life was ebbing away ; and when the last breath was
drawn, human ears could almost hear the 'Well done,
good and faithful servant ' which must have greeted
Thomas Dwight on the other shore/'

It was during this period of pain and work that Dr.
Dwight prepared and published his Thoughts of a Catholic
Anatomist, which, coming as it does as a kind of legacy,
may well be considered in the concluding lines of this
brief biography. In its preface he calls attention to the
fact that it is often said by those outside the Church
that they cannot see how a Catholic can be a man of
science and, conversely, how a man of science can be a
Catholic. It is to establish the contrary of both these
propositions that this series of lives of Catholic men of
science has been taken in hand, and no better example of
the kind of man who not only could be but was a devoted
son of the Church, almost one might say a " religious "
living in the world, and at the same time an exact, en-
thusiastic man of science, could possibly be desired. And
his book is the reflex of his double capacity. Returning
to the preface, he admits that he fears that there may be
many poorly instructed Catholics who hold the same
false idea as to the incompatibility of Catholicism and
science. And then, alluding to the two classes of persons
of whom he has been speaking, he continues : "It may
be that it is my duty, on account of the position I have
the honour to hold, to give to both these classes such poor
help as I can." In the earlier pages of his book he
laments that Catholics influence public opinion so
little as they do, and that they are not sufficiently
to the fore in the matter of proclaiming the message

241

1 8 Thomas Dwight

which the Church has for the world, scientific and
non-scientific.

Further, he contends, and rightly contends, that we
should not content ourselves with merely opposing false
opinions, but should constantly endeavour to bring
forward the better principles of which we ourselves are
in possession. His views on this point may be briefly
summarized in a quotation from his introductory chapter.
" I incline to sympathize with the sneer of a reviewer who,
in the discussion of a book maintaining that there is
nothing in religion contrary to science (or indeed in science
contrary to religion), exclaims, ' Nothing contrary 1 '
as one would say, ' Is that all ? Have you nothing
better than that ? ' It seems to me that many of the
apologists for Christianity have made the mistake of
fighting too much on the defensive. They have held
their position, they have shown the weakness of their
opponents ; but, if I mistake not, they for the most part
have stopped there, without going on to show that, as
far as science has anything to say in the matter, its
evidence is in support of religion, and that as a whole
the Catholic view of nature and man is grander,
more logical, and more satisfying than that of the
monist."

These few paragraphs are not intended either to contain
a synopsis or to act as a review of the Thoughts of a Catholic
Anatomist. It is a book that should be on the shelves of
every thoughtful man, and those troubled with scientific
difficulties will find within its pages much to help them
in their hour of trouble. Dr. Dwight was a man of firm
faith ; trust and confidence in God and the Church
which He has founded for our help and consolation were
the sure ground on which he rested, and he was not the
very least bit afraid to face any scientific theory, however
daring, and examine it with the care and skill which
he gained from many years of scientific work. Non-
242

Thomas Dwight 19

Catholics — some of them, one might perhaps even say
many of them — seem to hold the irritating and absurd
idea that Catholic men of science are afraid of the hypo-
theses of their non-Catholic brethren. This ridiculous
idea is coupled with another equally absurd, equally
untrue, one may add equally insulting, which is, that the
Catholic man of science, if he rejects or hesitates to accept
any of these hypotheses, does so, not on scientific grounds,
but because he is afraid to accept it on account of its
supposed antagonism to religious dogma. Dr. Dwight
shows the absurdity of these ideas in every line of his
work, and, if there were no other reason to welcome it, it
would be welcome because it disposes once and for all,
as far as rational men are concerned, of this absurd
fable.

This may, perhaps, be a not inopportune moment to
say something on this method of poisoning the wells.
There is something not a little irritating in the calm
assumption on the part of certain writers that anyone
who ventures to differ from them on a scientific point is
therefore obviously and undeniably biassed and influenced
by motives other than scientific in coming to the conclu-
sion arrived at. Let me take two examples of the kind
of thing to which I am alluding. In what should have
been the grave, impartial pages of the Darwin Festschrift,
issued by the University of Cambridge on the occasion
of the Centenary of Darwin's birth, Haeckel, whose record
hardly entitles him to criticise a man of such position,
is allowed to employ the most severe language respecting
Virchow on account of certain statements made by that
very distinguished man. Now, in the first place, who was
Virchow ? Well, he was not a Catholic, not even, I
believe, a Christian, but he certainly was one of the most
distinguished of the biologists and anthropologists of the
second half of the last century. His Cellular Pathology
caused a revolution in medical ideas ; the Archiv founded

243

2O Thomas D wight

by him was for many years, and still remains, one of
the most important scientific journals in the world, and
in a number of other ways Virchow won a fame such
as but few win. It was a fame, too, which promises to be
enduring, and one which is never likely to be tarnished
by the kind of accusations which have been freely made
respecting his critic. But Virchow had an independent
mind, and was not prepared to utter the shibboleth of the
day unless at the dictates of his own reason. And because
he was not prepared jurare in verba Haeckelii, he becomes
the target for the remarks of that luminary. It was not
dangerous for Haeckel to enter the lists against Virchow
when he did, for Virchow was then dead. The
courageous Haeckel entered the lion's den " knowing
the lion was not there, but dead." What is remark-
able is that such statements as those I am now about
to quote should have been allowed to appear where they
did appear.

Virchow, according to his critic, lacked " a broad equip-
ment in comparative anatomy and ontogeny," in other
words, he did not subscribe to Haeckel's views on those
subjects, nor admit the correctness of his diagrams and
the infallibility of his ideas as to the pedigree of man.
" In earlier years, and especially during his splendid
period of activity at Wiirzburg (1848-1856), he had been
a consistent free-thinker, and had in a number of able
articles (collected in his Gesammelte Abhandlungen)
upheld the unity of human nature, the inseparability of
body and spirit. In later years at Berlin, where he was
more occupied with political work and sociology (especi-
ally after 1866), he abandoned the positive monistic
position for one of agnosticism and scepticism, and made
concessions to the dualistic dogma of a spiritual world
apart from the material frame." On this passage it may
be observed how Haeckel calmly assumes that his
monistic theories are the one true faith, and that a

244

Thomas Dwight 21

departure from such views is a plunge into " agnosti-
cism and scepticism" the latter word being a peculiarly
choice example of his adoring attitude towards his own
theories.

But let us proceed with our subject. In 1877 Haeckel
tells us that he came into sharp conflict with Virchow.
Haeckel had given an address in which he sought to prove
that man, including his mental qualities, had been
derived from an extinct primate ancestor. Virchow
replied to this by an address on " The Freedom of Science
in the Modern State." In this " he spoke of the theory
of evolution as an unproved hypothesis, and declared
that it ought not to be taught in the schools, because it
was dangerous to the State. ' We must not,' he said,
' teach that man has descended from the ape or any other
animal/ " Let it be observed that at this very time
Virchow was President of the German Anthropological
Society, that is, that he held the highest position in con-
nection with the study of man which his scientific com-
peers had it in their power to confer on him. " Numbers
of journals and treatises repeated his dogmatic state-
ment : ' It is quite certain that man has descended
neither from the ape nor from any other animal.' In this
he persisted till his death in 1902." Now what is the
conclusion of the whole of this matter ? Obviously that
Virchow was wrong and Haeckel was right. And why ?
Because Haeckel says so. A conclusion very unlikely
to be accepted as convincing by any person who is in any
way familiar with the work and merits and estimation
amongst their scientific brethren of the two persons.
But the point to which I particularly wish to call atten-
tion is that the attempt to belittle the opinion of Virchow
on these matters is made not on scientific grounds, but on
the excuse that his mind had become tainted by the
" dualistic dogma of a spiritual world apart from the
material frame," in other words, that long thought had

245

22 Thomas Dwight

led him to the conclusion that there was more in heaven
and earth than finds a place in the Haeckelian philosophy.
Virchow, however, was not, as I have said, a Catholic,
not even a believer, so far as I understand his opinions,
in Christianity. How much more infamous is it when a
Christian, and still more a Catholic, ventures to criticize
current dogmata of science even from a purely scientific
standpoint. " For if in the green wood they do these
things, in the dry what shall be done ? "

So when Father Wasmann steps out to offer his
opinions on organic evolution and other kindred subjects,
approaching them as he does from a purely scientific
standpoint, one has no reason to wonder at the reception
which he meets. Father Wasmann is undoubtedly the
leading authority in the world on ants and termites and
their inquilines ; no one doubts that. His observations
and his writings are classics in that branch of knowledge.
No one, therefore, can speak of him as an amateur ; he is
a master in science. Well then, how is he to be attacked ?
The method is quite simple. Admit his contributions
to positive science, but say that when he comes to theory
he allows his scientific instinct to be clouded by his
religious opinions. There are, says one of his critics,
two personalities in Father Wasmann, as shown by the
letters after his name " S.J." Wasmann the scientific
man is excellent, but he allows himself to be influenced
and his judgement to be warped by Wasmann the Jesuit.
What a splendid argument, and how completely it over-
throws poor Father Wasmann! But let us turn this
critic's guns upon himself. After his name are the
letters "Ph.D." Is it wholly impossible that the
Critic and Philosopher may not be at times warped by
the Critic and Darwinian ? Is there no such thing as
"Darwinian bias" or "Darwinian dogmatism"? Pro-
fessor Driesch says that there is, and contrasts the dog-
matism of his followers with the open-mindedness of their

246

Thomas D wight 23

master. But enough of this. What has just been said
has been said with the object of warning readers that the
common method of meeting statements such as those
to which I have been alluding is to follow the ancient
legal advice : " No case ; abuse the plaintiff's attorney ! "
Fire the accusation that he is " reactionary " against
your opponent, and go your way satisfied that you have
destroyed him and his opinions for ever.

Reactionary motives ! That is what will be said about
Dwight and his book, perhaps is being said, as it is said
and has been said and probably will continue to be said
about any attempt to criticize the popular scientific idol
of the day. Yes : but by whom will it be said ? Not
by men of science, for no honest man of science can read
Dwight's book and think of it as other than candid
and fair ; not even by the ordinary uninstructed but
impartial reader, for to him again the candour of the
writer must and will be obvious. No; it is the
Haeckels and the jackals of the Haeckels of this world
who, beaten on their own field and totally unable to
answer the arguments advanced, choose this method,
the old Ephesian method of crying " Great is Diana of
the Ephesians."

A fair hearing — that is what may be asked for
Dr. Dwight's book ; and surely this brief account
of his life shows that its author is entitled to that
indulgence.

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON.

n.—Auf. 1912.

GENERAL LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA— BERKELEY

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