44 CIRCULATION OF THE BLOOD 



immediately discuss, Harvey urges the illustration of 

 the physiology and anatomy of man from that of animals. 



In the section of the manuscript notebook that deals with 

 the heart, Harvey describes its structure and that of the 

 great vessels. Then he goes on to deal with the contrac- 

 tion of the various cavities of the heart and of the great 

 vessels. He terminates this short section by saying that he 

 has demonstrated the perpetual motion of the blood in a 

 circle, and that this motion is produced by the heart-beat. 



In these lectures, as in his other works, Harvey shows 

 considerable but not remarkable learning. He pays 

 very great, almost excessive, homage to the ancient 

 writers. His respect for the ancients is perhaps some- 

 what unusual even for his time, an age that almost 

 worshipped the past. Yet his acquaintance with 

 Greek anatomical and physiological writings was evid- 

 ently mainly, if not entirely, through Latin translations. 

 From his frequent quotations we can make out a list 

 of the books that he had read, and it is evident that 

 his reading was typical of his age and of his own con- 

 servative leanings. What he omits is almost as char- 

 acteristic of the man as is what he inserts. His lecture 

 notes are full of homely references, yet he does not men- 

 tion the works of Shakespeare, his contemporary, nor any 

 of the literature of his time. The authors he quotes most 

 frequently are, first, Aristotle and then Galen. He was 

 very closely acquainted with the works of the greatest 

 anatomical writers of his age, Vesalius, Falloppius, 

 Columbus among them, and, especially and naturally, 

 those of his teacher, Fabricius. 



The chief characteristic that separates these lecture 

 notes from most of the anatomical works of his time, 

 except those of Fabricius, is the remarkably extensive 

 first-hand knowledge of the anatomy of animals they 

 exhibit. We have seen that Fabricius had set him the 



