History and Progress of Comparative Anatomy. 65 

 family of the Pope; and their seclusion in the Papal library till 

 the year 1712, when they were presented by Clement XII. to 

 Lancisi, who published them in 17U, has retarded for 150 

 years the progress of anatomical knowledge, and given celebrity 

 to many names which would have been known only in the veri- 

 fication of the discoveries of Eustachio. 



At the period of their rediscovery, these plates were without 

 reference or description ; and it is believed that any descriptive 

 commentary which the author wrote, must have been lost. The 

 object of Eustachio, however, may be conjectured partly from 

 the delineations themselves, and partly from the observations 

 contained in the Opuscula, which may be regarded as the com- 

 mencement of the work. It appears that Eustachio undertook 

 the opposite and contradictory task of defending Galen, and 

 shewing the imperfection of the researches of those anatomists 

 who attacked the physician of Pergamus. As he proceeded, he 

 seems most fortunately to have lost sight of the first object, and 

 adhered rigorously to the second ; and the result has been, that 

 he has made a greater number of discoveries than any of his 

 predecessors or contemporaries ; and, by his individual efforts, 

 has done as much for the advancement, rectification, and improve- 

 ment of anatomy, as all the anatomists for nearly two hundred 

 years after him had joindy effected. He had, indeed, rectified and 

 improved the whole system of human anatomy so much, that, 

 as is justly observed by Lauth, had the author himself lived to 

 publish his delineations, anatomical knowledge would have at- 

 tained the perfection of the 18th century two centuries earlier 

 at least. 



The imperfect form in which these figures were pubUshed by 

 Lancisi, in 1714, induced Cajetan Petrioh, a Roman surgeon, 

 to republish them in 1740. The confused manner in which 

 this author added notes and explanations on previous notes and 

 explanations, only shewed his incapacity for the task ; and, af- 

 ter various detached comments had been made by Morgagni, 

 Fantoni, and Winslow, a full and complete explanation, much 

 abler than any heretofore, was given in 1744 by Albinus. Even 

 after this commentary, however, Haller remarks, there are va- 

 rious unexplained topics in the plates on the nerves and blood- 

 vessels. In 1755, the first Monro superintended in this city 

 the publication of a series of posthumous commentaries by Dr 



