16 THE GROWTH OF TRUTH 



Montpellier, Paris, and Leyden. In 1593 a well-to-do 

 young Englishman who wished to study medicine 

 thoroughly went to North Italy, and most naturally to 

 Padua ' fair Padua, nursery of the arts ' whose close 

 affiliations with us may be gathered from the fact that, 

 of universities next to Oxford and Cambridge, she has 

 given us more Presidents than any other. In the years 

 that had passed since Vesalius had retired in disgust, the 

 fame of its anatomical school had been well maintained 

 by Fallopius, Columbus, and Fabricius, worthy succes- 

 sors of the great master. Of each may be said what 

 Douglas says of the first named : ' In docendo maxime 

 methodicits, in medendo felicissimus, in secando expertissi- 

 mus.' While the story of Harvey's student life can 

 never be told as we could wish, we know enough to 

 enable us to understand the influences which moulded 

 his career. In Fabricius he found a man to make his 

 life-model. To the enthusiastic teacher and investigator 

 were added those other qualities so attractive to the 

 youthful mind, generous sympathies and a keen sense 

 of the wider responsibilities of his position, as shown in 

 building, at his own expense, a new anatomical theatre 

 for the University. Wide as was the range of his 

 master's studies, embracing not alone anatomy but 

 medicine and surgery, the contributions by which he is 

 most distinguished are upon subjects in which Harvey 

 himself subsequently made an undying reputation. The 

 activity of his literary life did not begin until he had 

 been teaching nearly forty years, and it is a fact of the 

 highest significance that, corresponding to the very 

 period of Harvey's stay in Padua, Fabricius must have 

 been deep in the study of embryology and of the 

 anatomy of the vascular system. His great work on 

 generation was the model on which Harvey based his 



