The researches of Pasteur in respect to the forms of disease in French
vineyards opened a fruitful field of inquiry, and the theories of Dr.
Bastian on spontaneous generation gave rise to the beautiful series
of experiments by Tyndall on bacterian life. A large band of leading
scientific men, both in this country and over the whole world, were
devoting their energies to a knowledge of the recent theories on the
propagation of disease by germs. In a lecture on fermentation, Tyndall
remarked that the researches, by means of which science has recently
elucidated the causes of fermentation, have raised the art of brewing
from being an art founded on empirical observation--that is to say,
on the observation of facts apart from the principles which explain
them--into what may be termed an exact science.
In like manner, if recent theories on the propagation of disease by
germs were proved to be correct, and if the laws which govern the
propagation or destruction of those germs were known, the art of the
physician would be similarly raised. Upon these questions leading
scientific men all over the world were devoting their energies. Research
had shown that putrefaction was only another form of organized life, and
Tyndall had shown that in the moving particles of fine dust discovered
by a ray of light in a dark room the germs of low forms of life, which
would cause putrefaction, were ever present, and ready to spring into
life when a favorable "nidus" for the development of the organism was
provided.
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