As a professor of chemistry at the Collège de France, it is with much emotion and respect that I recall Charles Moureu’s name, even though it is associated with the production of chemical weapons and poison gases during the First World War. It is important to bear in mind the violence of the historical conditions in which French intellectuals worked at the time. Patriotic and nationalistic feelings were exacerbated and played a crucial role in their professional and political choices. What m...