A Great Catholic Scientist

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 08, 8 October 1908, Page 10

A Great Catholic Scientist

the wn m ' T • ? SC ' enCC> n °' ° nly in Francc ' bllt !n P^T . Such 1S the Ascription of Louis Pasteur, the grent Catholic scientist, given by Thomas Dwight, M D ILD Parkman Professor of Anatomy a.- the Harvard Medical School! Boston, , n an address ddive.ed at the recent Convention of the American rederahon of Catholic Sociotic,, .oported in the 5. H Review of August 15.

_ Among the many practical triumphs of this devout Catholic mvesngato,-, he delivered 0 death-blow to the theory of spontaneous generation, and revolutionised bcth medicine and surgery. . rhrougl, otner experiments, ' sa 3 ., n, . Dvvu'ht 'he established .he principles by which ascpUc surgery sible. No man did so much for the introduction" of the practical part, in spite of .idicule and unbelief, as Mr. Joseph Lister,, of Glasgow. . . In 1874 he wiote to thank Pasteur for " having taught him the only principle which could lead to the success of the system of antiseptics." Later on, when Lord lister he spoke yet more strongly, as the representative of the Royal' So

ciety, at Pasteur's Jubilee. " Truly," he said, " there does not exist in the entire world any individual to whom the medical sciences owe more than they do to you. Thanks to you, surgery has undergone a complete revolution, which has deprived it of its tenor, and has extended almost without limit its efficacious power." . . It has been said that Pasteur's discoveries sufficed of themselves to cover the war indemnity of five milliards of francs paid by France to Germany. . . There is still to mention the introduction of inoculation against anthrax, a deadly disease of animals, and, finally, against the dread hydrophobia in man. Of old, this terrible disease was practically universally fatal; now, among those treated at ihc Pasteur Institute, the deaths are less than one in two hundred. 1

To be deep in history, as Newman found, is to be a Catholic. To be deep in science was, to Pasteur, to be a fervent Catholic. ' The more I know,' said he, ' the moie nearly does my faith approach that of a Breton peasant ' (the most devout peasantry, perhaps, in Europe) ' Could I but know it all,' added Pasteur, 'my faith would, doubtless, cqval that r of a Br-tor. peasant's wife.' When he wont into the greater Life, through the door of death, in 1895, he was fortified by the Sacraments ot the Church ; and, as he passed, one hand clasped the image of his crucified Lord, the other held the hand of his pious Catholic wife. •