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but he was soon recalled and throughout his life enjoyed a great reputation. 

 He died in 1656 of a serious plague, which he had endeavoured to stamp out. 

 He wrote a handbook of human anatomy, a monograph on the viper, and, 

 finally, the work which made his name famous: Zootomia Democritea. 



Zootomia Democritea 

 Severing introduces his work with a defence of the comparative study of 

 the anatomy of different animals, the advantages of which he demonstrates 

 in a dichotomously arranged table, and then further dilates upon them with 

 a mass of quotations from other authors and arguments of his own. He finds 

 its best to begin the study of anatomy with animals, as they often have a 

 simpler and more easily accessible organization than man, with whom, 

 moreover, animal dissections offer interesting possibilities of comparison. 

 He submits a comprehensive plan of organization for the entire animal 

 kingdom, and even extends his interest to the invertebrates. He also discusses 

 the anatomy of plants. His special zootomical investigations, which com- 

 prise the fourth section of his work, actually consist of a miscellany of notes 

 on the anatomy of a number of different animal forms; he never records the 

 results of a radical anatomical study of any particular animal. The chapter 

 entitled "Tetrapodographia' recounts scattered observations on the anatomy 

 of domestic animals in particular, but also of the fox, the hare, the mole, 

 the tortoise, and the hedgehog. The "Ornithograpbia" contains similar in- 

 formation on birds and a special comparative study of their feet; details 

 (mostly external) are given of insects and spiders, and thif zootomical hand- 

 book closes with a chapter on fishes, of which the ink-fish are dealt with in 

 greater detail. The last section of the work consists of an account of the 

 technique of the subject; the usual dissecting instruments are described, and 

 even the use of the magnifying-glass is recommended. 



The title of the book, Zootomia Democritea, testifies to the tendency of 

 the work from beginning to end — antipathy to Aristotle, a feeling which 

 had been inculcated into Severino in Campanella's school. In the first 

 chapter he sets up the observation of nature in opposition to the theories of 

 Aristotle — the same system of natural observation on which Democritus 

 laid so much stress. Severino does not succeed, however, in creating any fresh 

 conception of natural phenomena in the place of the Aristotelean, and so, 

 like Campanella, he has to a great extent to fall back upon the mediaeval 

 schoolmen, whose deductive method of argument and proof he employs in 

 his zootomical studies. 



The death-blow to Aristotle's biological theories was destined to come 

 from quite a different quarter; curiously enough, from a man who had the 

 greatest respect for his teaching, but who at the same time established cer- 

 tain facts which rendered it impossible for him to follow it. 



