“My head is full of splendid projects; the war sent my brain to grass, but I now feel ready for further work. Perhaps I am deluding myself; anyhow I will try.... Oh! why am I not rich, a millionaire? I would say to you, to Raulin, to Gernez, to Van Tieghem, etc., come, we will transform the world by our discoveries. How fortunate you are to be young and strong! Why can I not begin a new life of study and work! Unhappy France, beloved country, if I could only assist in raising thee from thy disasters!” A few days later, in a letter to Raulin, this desire for devoted work was again expressed almost feverishly. He could foresee, in the dim distance, secret affinities between apparently dissimilar things. He had at that time returned to the researches which had absorbed his youth (because those studies were less materially difficult to organize), and he could perceive laws and connections between the facts he had observed and those of the existence of which he felt assured. “I have begun here some experiments in crystallization which will open a great prospect if they should lead to positive results. You know that I believe that there is a cosmic dissymmetric influence which presides constantly and naturally over the molecular organization of principles immediately essential to life; and that, in consequence of this, the species of the three kingdoms, by their structure, by their form, by the disposition of their tissues, have a definite relation to the movements of the universe. For many of those species, if not for all, the sun is the _primum movens_ of nutrition; but I believe in another influence which would affect the whole organization, for it would be the cause of the molecular dissymmetry proper to the chemical components of life. I want to be able by experiment to grasp a few indications as to the nature of this great cosmic dissymmetrical influence. It must, it may be electricity, magnetism.... And, as one should always proceed from the simple to the complex, I am now trying to crystallize double racemate of soda and ammonia under the influence of a spiral solenoid. “I have various other forms of experiment to attempt. If one of them should succeed, we shall have work for the rest of our lives, and in one of the greatest subjects man could approach, for I should not despair of arriving by this means at a very deep, unexpected and extraordinary modification of the animal and vegetable species. “Good-bye, my dear Raulin. Let us endeavour to distract our thoughts from human turpitudes by the disinterested search after truth.”