TRANSLATOR'S POSTSCRIPT 



Veritas nos liberabit 



As far as I can find, this is the third attempt to render Har- 

 vey's classic into current English idiom. The first, which I 

 have not seen, was apparently an anonymous effort prefaced 

 by a Zachariah Wood of Rotterdam, and printed by Francis 

 Leach for Richard Lowndes of London, in 1653. This octavo 

 was reprinted in 1673. The second was the well known trans- 

 lation made for the Sydenham Society by Robert Willis and 

 published in 1847. Reprinted in London in 1889, in Canterbury 

 in 1894, and in Everyman's Library in 1907, this has become the 

 standard English version. Although an excellent translation, 

 its stilted and involved phraseology makes it rather difficult 

 reading for those more accustomed to present diction. As 

 Mencken has intimated in connection with similar classics, 

 this greatly interferes with their proper appreciation. From 

 my rather limited experience with medical students and physi- 

 cians, I am confident that they would welcome the chance to 

 study the works of the great contributors to their profession 

 were these to be offered to them in an attractive and easily 

 readable form. 



This prompted Mr. Thomas to suggest, when we discussed a 

 tercentennial edition of Harvey's great book, that a new trans- 

 lation in the language and spirit of our times be attempted. 

 Using Willis as a "pony," this has been an easy and delightful 

 task. In his more scientific passages, Harvey is remarkably 

 terse and snappy, in the current style. In his philosophical dis- 

 cussions he becomes vague and his sentences grow beyond 

 control, but whose do not? 



Not possessing a copy of the first edition, the basis of my 

 translation was the miserably printed Longhine edition of 1697, 

 which omits the dedication. Willis's translation of the dedi- 



[135I 



