ledge of syphilis; centuries of acquisition added one fact to another, until we had a body of clinical and pathological knowledge of remarkable fullness. For the last quarter of a century we have had latent possession of the cause of the disease, as no one could doubt the legitimate inference from discoveries in other acute infections. The conscious possession has just been given to us. After scores of investigators had struggled in vain with the problem, came Schaudinn with an instinct for truth, with a capacity to pass beyond the routine of his day, and with a vision for the whole where others had seen but in part. It is one of the tragedies of science that this brilliant investigator, with capabilities for work so phenomenal, should have been cut off at the very threshold of his career. The cancer problem, still in the stage of latent possession, awaits the advent of a man of the same type. In a hundred other less important problems, acquisition has by slow stages become latent possession; and there needs but the final touch— the crystal in the saturated solution—to give us conscious possession of the truth. But when these stages are ended, there remains the final struggle for general acceptance. Locke’s remark that ‘Truth scarce ever yet carried it by vote anywhere at its first appearance' is borne out by the history of all discoveries of the first rank. The times, however, are changing; and it is interesting to compare the cordial welcome of the pallid spirochaete with the chilly reception of the tubercle bacillus. Villemin had done his great work, Cohnheim and Salmonson had finally solved the problem of infectivity, when Koch published his memorable studies. Others before him had seen the bacillus, but the conscious possession of the truth only came with his marvellous technique. Think of the struggle to
