Louis Pasteur

Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goal. My strength lies solely in my tenacity.
– Louis Pasteur

Where observation is concerned, chance favors only the prepared mind.
– Louis Pasteur

When I approach a child, he inspires in me two sentiments; tenderness for what he is, and
respect for what he may become.
– Louis Pasteur

Do not let yourself be tainted with a barren skepticism.
– Louis Pasteur

The Greeks have given us one of the most beautiful words of our language, the word
“enthusiasm” – a God within.
– Louis Pasteur

I am utterly convinced that science and peace will triumph over ignorance and war, that
nations will eventually unite not to destroy but to edify, and that the future will belong to
those who have done the most for the sake of suffering humanity.
– Louis Pasteur

The universe is asymmetric and I am persuaded that life, as it is known to us, is a direct
result of the asymmetry of the universe or of its indirect consequences. The universe is
asymmetric.
– Louis Pasteur

Wine is the most healthful and most hygienic of beverages.
– Louis Pasteur

There does not exist a category of science to which one can give the name applied science.
There are science and the applications of science, bound together as the fruit of the tree
which bears it.
– Louis Pasteur

A bottle of wine contains more philosophy than all the books in the world.
– Louis Pasteur

Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity, and is the torch which
illuminates the world.
– Louis Pasteur

The role of the infinitely small in nature is infinitely great.
– Louis Pasteur

Science brings men nearer to God.
– Louis Pasteur

Posterity will one day laugh at the foolishness of modern materialistic philosophers. The more I
study nature, the more I stand amazed at the work of the Creator. I pray while I am engaged
at my work in the laboratory.
– Louis Pasteur

I am on the edge of mysteries and the veil is getting thinner and thinner.
– Louis Pasteur

The idea of God is a form of the idea of the infinite. As long as the mystery of the infinite
weighs on human thought, temples will be erected for the worship of the infinite, whether
God is called Brahma, Allah, Jehovah, or Jesus; and on the pavement of these temples, men
will be seen kneeling, prostrated, annihilated by the thought of the infinite.
– Louis Pasteur

Chance favors the prepared mind.
– Louis Pasteur

To bring one’s self to believe in a truth that has just dawned upon one is the first step
towards progress; to persuade others is the second.
– Louis Pasteur

Blessed is he who carries within himself a God, an ideal, and who obeys it: Ideal of art, ideal
of science, ideal of the gospel virtues, therein lie the springs of great thoughts and great
actions; they all reflect light from the Infinite.
– Louis Pasteur

There are two men in each one of us: The scientist, he who starts with a clear field and
desires to rise to the knowledge of nature through observations, experimentation and
reasoning, and the man of sentiment, the man of belief, the man who mourns his dead
children, and who cannot, alas, prove that he will see them again, but who believes that he
will, and lives in the hope – the man who will not die like a vibrio, but who feels that the force
that is within him cannot die.
– Louis Pasteur

I beseech you to take interest in these sacred domains so expressively called laboratories.
Ask that there be more and that they be adorned for these are the temples of the future,
wealth and well-being. It is here that humanity will grow, strengthen and improve. Here,
humanity will learn to read progress and individual harmony in the works of nature, while
humanity’s own works are all too often those of barbarism, fanaticism and destruction.
– Louis Pasteur

One does not ask of one who suffers: What is your country and what is your religion? One
merely says: You suffer, that is enough for me.
– Louis Pasteur

There is a time in every man’s life when he looks to his God, when he looks at his life, when
he wonders how he will be remembered.
– Louis Pasteur