Sinclair, Sir William J.: Semmelweis. His Life and his Doctrine (Manchester, 1909)
V. Life in Buda-Pesth
128 OBSTETRIC CLINIC Such is the privilege of the anonymous medical journalist and reviewer—to exhibit ignorance not without personal animus in assailing the exposed victim from the safe shelter of anonymity. In 1856 Professor Klein died, and Carl Braun, who had succeeded Semmelweis as Assistant and had been permitted to retain that position for five years, only resigning to accept a call to a professor’s chair in Trient, was appointed successor. It would be useless to speculate on what were the feelings of Semmelweis over this event. What hopes and aspirations he may have entertained about the influence of his principles, and their possible fruition to the extent of recalling him to Vienna. But he naturally did not see things in due perspective : whatever influence his old friends in Vienna might have been able to exercise in his favour—and they were all there still,—they were not likely to move after their experience of his behaviour in 1850. Then he had written and published nothing. For Englishmen it is difficult to appreciate the importance of “ original work ” upon professional promotion in Germany. It is the cause of the production of the floods of long, dreary, unreadable contributions, which swamp their professional journalism. With this German usage we have no quarrel : we are not compelled to read all : we are at liberty to make more or less judicious selections. But Semmelweis had done nothing to attract attention, he had published no work; he had so exaggerated in his own mind the importance of his principles that he believed due recognition was certain to come; and he had now the bitter experience of seeing Carl Braun Professor and Director of the First Clinic. Here then was another antagonist in the Chair of Obstetrics in succession, but an antagonist of a very different type : not merely a silent, resentful and jealous man, like Professor Klein, but a master of gibe and sarcasm, and not too exacting with himself in the matter of strict scientific and historic accuracy. His methods of controversy conformed more nearly to what we recognise as
