Louis Pasteur

18 LOUIS PASTEUR
Faculty of Sciences at Lille in 1854, the impact reached him
through official channels. The decree organizing the new Science
Faculties throughout France was very explicit; their role was to
encourage the applications of science to the local industries.
In a letter written during March 1855, the Minister of Public
Education followed his appreciation of the success of Pasteur
in his new functions by the following warning: "Let M. Pasteur
be careful, however, not to be guided exclusively by his love for
science. He should not lose sight of the fact that to produce use-
ful results and extend its favorable influence, the teaching in
the faculties, while remaining at the highest level of scientific
theory, should nevertheless adapt itself, by as many applications
as possible, to the practical needs of the country." M. For-
toul, Minister of Public Education in the conservative government
of Napoleon III, would have been much surprised and
disturbed had he recognized, in his recommendation to Pasteur,
the echo of another statement made almost simultaneously by
Karl Marx: "Hitherto, philosophers have sought to understand
the world, henceforth they must seek to change it."
In his letters from Paris and Strasbourg to his friend Chappuis,
Pasteur talked of crystals as a lover of pure science, without ever
referring to the possible role of his work in modifying the life of
man. In response to his new responsibilities in Lille he soon became
acutely conscious of wider social duties, emphasizing in
his lectures the role of science in the practical life of the citizen
and of the nation. Said he: "Where will you find a young man
whose curiosity and interest will not immediately be awakened
when you put into his hands a potato, when with that potato he
produces sugar, with that sugar, alcohol, with that alcohol ether
and vinegar? Where is he that will not be happy to tell his fam-
ily in the evening that he has just been working out an electric
telegraph
. . . ?
"Do you know when it first saw the light, this electric telegraph,
one of the most marvelous applications of modern science? It was
in that memorable year, 1822: Oersted, a Danish physicist, held
in his hands a piece of copper wire, joined by its extremities to