This article is reprinted from the WeChat platform: Wen Pier, written by Hu Shi

I remember that Hu Shi was criticized and ridiculed for "pragmatism" a long time ago, but few people have mentioned it recently. Indeed, "Study more problems and talk less about doctrines." Now rereading this sentence, and corresponding to this article "Academic Salvation of the Nation", Hu Gong's extraordinary wisdom and patriotic sentiments emerge vividly on the page.

Today's time is very short, I don't want to say too much. I haven’t been to college for almost nine months! Now I want to go to Europe. Go, I really don’t want to come back! It would be nice to find a place to eat and study there. But I am not sure whether my conscience will allow me to do this. It depends on which aspect of conscience overcomes. Let me say a few words today as parting words.

In August last year, I published an article talking about saving the country and studying. At that time, many people attacked me. But society gives us reputation, so we should speak based on our conscience, knowledge, and morality. The qualifications given to us as leaders by society are to enable us to speak out and do things at the critical moment of life and death. They are not given to us by reputation so that we can eat and get money. What I say may not be easy to hear, but you must know that words that are not easy to hear are also rare!

Last year I said that saving the country cannot be achieved by waving flags and shouting; it requires a large number of people to devote themselves to academic careers and work hard and realistically. Just now Mr. Kato said the various facts that made New Japan become New Japan, which moved me very much. Japan is a small country, but now it is one of the four major powers in the world. This did not happen by chance. They succeeded because most of them tried their best to absorb Western science and scholarship. You know that no matter what we want to do, we cannot do it without academics.

So I advocate that we should save the country with personality and save the country with academics. Today I will only talk briefly about the second point.

When the world is in chaos, it is not a shame for a small number of people to continue to learn from the fundamentals regardless of the changing circumstances. Three days after the "March 18th" massacre, I gave a lecture at Shanghai Datong College. This was what I meant. Today, when I return to the university to meet you for the first time, I still mean the same thing: I want to save the country through academics.

This book is the biography of the Frenchman Pasteur. I read it when I was sick in Shanghai. I actually cried when I read some parts.

Bachelor was born during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. France was defeated. German soldiers marched to Paris, captured the emperor, and occupied the city. They ordered the alliance under the city to pay an indemnity of fifty million. This compensation is one-fifth more than our Boxer compensation. It also cut off the two provinces of Alsace and Rollins and Germany. If you look at the literature of the time, such as the works of Maupassant, you can see the tragedy and sorrow of France's almost subjugation at that time. Pasteur was already very famous at this time. I saw that legal persons were subjected to all kinds of abuses. The Academy of Sciences had never been destroyed in wars, but this time it was all destroyed. He was so angry that he returned all the doctoral diplomas given to him by the University of Bonn in Germany to Germany. He also wrote an article saying: "Why did France lose the war? It is because France has no talents. Why does France have no talents? It is because France is not good at science." In the past, France did not lose the war with Germany because of Navasi Lauostes is an ordinary scientist who has various inventions that are suitable for application. Later, Navasir and others were killed by the revolutionary army. On the day he was about to be killed, Moner said: "My duty is to manage the manufacture of guns. I only care about the quality of the guns. I don't care about anything else." The revolution can only succeed if science helps the revolution. But this time France was unable to defeat the newly created but ununified Germany, entirely due to the lack of scientific progress. But twenty years later, the British said that the results of Bast's one-man experiment were more than enough to repay the compensation of 50 million yuan.

There are many achievements in the Pap test. Today I will mention three things:

First, about wine making.

He studied fermentation and believed that a thing would not change for no reason. There must be microorganisms causing trouble. Others, such as sores and rot in humans, and infectious diseases are also caused by microorganisms. Wine is produced in the south of France, but the damage caused by wine spoilage is huge. Pasteur studied it carefully and thought that the reason why the wine went bad was because of the presence of microorganisms in it. Why did microorganisms come? He said there are three types: one is from the air, the other is from the utensils, and the third is from the material. He wanted to avoid and remedy this problem. After many experiments, he found that if the wine was boiled to 50 to 55 degrees, it would not go bad. But no one believed him at the time. The warships under the jurisdiction of the French Admiralty need a lot of wine when sailing to foreign countries. After a long time, they always drink sour wine. I just wanted to try the pasteurization method and boil the wine to 55 degrees. After ten months, the cooked wine was all good, with an extra strong aroma and color. The ones that were not cooked were all spoiled. Later, he carried a large amount of boiled wine to Africa, which was not bad either. As a result, France's annual income increased by tens of millions.

Second, about sericulture.

The annual income from French sericulture is huge. But one year, a plague suddenly broke out in the silkworms, and they had pepper spots on their bodies, causing heavy losses. Pasteur then went to do research. The results of the research showed that there was no disease. It was due to the microorganisms that were born during the pupa and transformation into moths. No one believed it. Lyon held a committee to discuss the matter. Pasteur sent several types of silkworms A, B, C, and D to the committee, and noted them one by one, saying that some species had spots, some species had microorganisms, some species should be all alive, and some species should be all dead.

Lyon studied the experiments in the special committee, and all of them were consistent with what Pasteur said. Pasteur also came up with various simple methods to make silkworm farmers buy microscopes to select silkworm seeds. Those who cannot afford a microscope can send their seeds to the Public Security Bureau, where officers will examine them for them. As a result, France's sericulture has greatly improved and its income has increased sharply.

Third, about animal husbandry.

France has always placed emphasis on agriculture, and animal husbandry is very prosperous. In the 19th century, cattle and sheep suddenly contracted spleen plague. Within a few days, they all bleed black and died. Countless cattle and sheep were lost across the country. Pasteur thought that this must be the reason why a pathogen was introduced into livestock, so he tried his best to study and experiment. From 1877 to 1881 it was not found. At that time, another chicken plague occurred. Pasteurization identifies the germs that cause chicken distemper and injects it into other chickens, and the other chickens immediately become infected with the disease. However, if this kind of bacteria is left for a long time and injected into the chicken body, it will have no effect. He thought this must be the ability of oxygen to reduce the reproduction of germs. And continue to study that if the bacteria is cooked to between 42 and 45 degrees, it will not grow. Moreover, if less virulent germs are injected into livestock, then no more virulent germs will be encountered in the future. Because resistance has been built up in the body.

At that time, many academic gentlemen were opposed to him and wanted to make him lose face. So they gathered some people and bought some cows and sheep, and invited Pasteur to test it. Pasteur injected some cattle and sheep twice with mildly toxic bacteria. In the third time, everyone is injected with poisonous and lethal germ liquid. Declare that no one who takes three injections will die, and no one who takes one injection will live. This was like telling fortunes with cattle and sheep. At that time, many people laughed at him and worried about him. But before it expired, his students wrote to him and told him that all his words had come true, and asked him to come and see it as soon as possible. So thousands of people came to see him, praise him, and welcome him. Even those who opposed him took the stage and declared that they believed in what he said.

This invention has made great progress in medicine, and people all over the world have benefited from it. Doesn't this only pay 50 million yuan in compensation to the law? This is simply beyond counting!

It took him four years of hard work to come up with this test. He said to his wife: "If this was not invented by the French, I would be really angry."

This man is our role model and this is saving the country. We need to know what we do as college students in a university. I hope our classmates and friends will note that our responsibility is to contribute to the country and society through academic research.

Without science, war and revolution are impossible!