Once a man approached great German scientist Virchow and said: “Professor! They say that you are a rude blockhead, but I am so interested in your research that I am ready to be a small chip next to you.” The rude blockhead’s research was indeed fascinating. After all, none other but Rudolf Virchow was one of the founders of the cell theory that radically changed medicine and turned it into a truly scientific natural discipline. Virchow’s famous “every cell is derived from a [preexisting] cell” closed the centuries-old dispute about the spontaneous generation of organisms. Being a pathologist and histologist, Virchow was the first man to clarify the essence of many diseases and pathological processes, established the structure of many organs and tissues in the human body. Being an anthropologist, Virchow grasped the anatomical features of the races. Anthropology led Virchow to archeology. Together with famous Schliemann, he was digging Troy, traveling around Egypt, Nubia and the Peloponnese, and conducting research into mummies. Enough? That’s not all: hygienist Virchow researched infectious diseases, contributed to the establishment of hospitals and schools. And when Virchow realized that, according to him, “the physicians are the natural attorneys of the poor, and the social problems should largely be solved by them,” he took up politics at the city level. Thanks to Virchow, Berlin became much cleaner and more comfortable in the second half of the 19th century. There are many anecdotes about how Virchow was giving an examination. Once the professor asked a question: “A patient with pain in his kidneys has come to you. What are you going to do?” Student: “At first, I’ll give him morphine to relieve his pain.” Virchow: “In what dosage?” Student: “Half a gram.” “And what are you going to do about the corpse?” Virchow asked busily. At one of his lectures, Virchow was demonstrating an experiment: he was removing some part of the toad’s brain. The toad’s body began to twitch, and the students laughed. Virchow reacted immediately: “Thus, ladies and gentlemen, our experiment has brilliantly proved that little brain is needed to cheer up the entire audience!”
