NA TURE 



417 



THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 1878 



SCIENTIFIC WORTHIES 



XH.— William Harvey,' Born April i, 1578, 

 Died June 3, 1658 



WILLIAM HARVEY was born three hundred years 

 ago, on the first of April, 1578, at Folkestone, in 

 Kent. He was the eldest son of his father ; who seems 

 to have been a substantial farmer, wealthy enough to send 

 his eldest son to the university and to embark his five 

 other male children in the mercantile pursuits in which 

 they all acquired riches. At sixteen, Harvey was sent 

 to Caius College, Cambridge, and graduated B.A. at 

 nineteen. But, desiring to become a physician, Harvey 

 wisely determined to proceed with his medical studies at 

 one of the great continental seats of learning ; and, by 

 good hap, chose the University of Padua, which had been 

 famous for a long succession of admirable anatomists, 

 among them Vesalius and Fabricius of Aquapendente, 

 who was the incumbent of the anatomical chair in 

 Harvey's time. 



After five years' study at Padua, Harvey took his 

 doctor's degree in 1602, returned to England, and ob- 

 tained the doctorate of his own university. In 1604, 

 he married, began practice in London, and five years 

 afterwards became physician to St. Bartholomew's Hos- 

 pital. In 1615, Harvey was elected " Professor of 

 Anatomy and Surgery " by the College of Physicians, 

 and his first course of lectures was delivered in 161 6. It 

 is possible that he expounded his ideas respecting the 

 circulation of the blood on this occasion ; but, in this case, 

 it is not obvious why he himself, in the dedication of the 

 " Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis," 

 published in 1628, should not have said so. On the 

 contrary he writes : — 



" Meatn de moiu et usu cordis et circuitu sanguinis 

 sententiam E.D.D. antea saepius in praelectionibus meis 

 anatomicis aperui novam ; sed jam per novem et amplius 

 annos multis ocularibus demonstrationibus in conspectu 

 vestro confirmatam, rationibus et argumentis illustratam, 

 et ab objectionibus doctissimorum et peritissimorum 

 anatomicorum liberatam, toties ab omnibus desideratam, 

 a quibusdam efflagitatam, in lucem et conspectum omnium 

 hoc libello produximus." 



Why "jam per novem ct amplius annos," if he had 

 really taught the circulation " per duodecim annos .? " 

 Harvey is so careful a writer that I cannot doubt he had 

 a meaning in the use of the particular words he has 

 adopted, and that he did not wish to lay claim to having 

 enunciated his complete views before 161 8 or 1619. 



However this may be, the famous treatise itself was not 

 given to the public until 1628, and its appearance conferred 

 upon its author a fame which rapidly extended over the 

 civilised world. James the First died in 1625, and it 

 is, on the whole, pleasant to reflect that Harvey owed 

 nothing to that foul pedant. But his son was a man of a 

 different stamp, and whatever the verdict on his political 

 deeds may be, shines as one of the few English sovereigns 

 who have shown an enlightened sympathy with letters, 



' The portrait of Harvey will be presented to our readers in one of the 

 May numbers of Nathpf,. Though every facility has been afforded by the 

 College of Physicians, there has been unavoidable delay in its preparation. 



Vol. XVII. — No. 439 



with science, and with art. Harvey became Charles the 

 First's physician about 1632, and the monarch repaid the 

 real respect and affection with which his eminent subject 

 evidently regarded him, in the only way for which Harvey 

 was likely to care ; namely, by doing his best to aid him 

 in his investigations, and taking a cordial and intelligent 

 interest in them. 



Between 1630 and 1632, Harvey travelled on the Con- 

 tinent with the young Duke of Lennox ; and, in 1636, he 

 was physician to the Earl of Arundel's embassy to the 

 Emperor. During this visit, he is said to have tried to 

 convince Caspar Hofmann, of Nuremberg, of the circu- 

 lation of the blood, experimentally, but in vain. When 

 the troubles between the King and the Parliament broke, 

 out, Harvey accompanied his master in his campaigns 

 He was at the battle of Edgehill, in charge of the Prince 

 of Wales and the Duke of York; and he told Aubrey that 

 <'he withdrew with them under a hedge, and tooke out of 

 his pockett a booke and read. But he had not read very 

 long before a bullet of a great gun grazed on the ground 

 neare him, which made him remove his station." 



By the King's order, Harvey was elected Warden of 

 Merton College, Oxford, in 1645 ; and to the same 

 efficient cause, or to the fact that he was the King's 

 physician, we must probably look for the conference of 

 an honorary degree by the University of that day on a 

 mere scientific discoverer. But, after the surrender of 

 Oxford in the following year, Harvey retired from public 

 life altogether, and spent the remainder of his days at 

 the homes of one or other of his brothers, in the neigh- 

 bourhood of London. 



In 1649 Harvey, published his two letters to Riolan, 

 which form a supplement to the "Exercitatio Anatomica ;" 

 and, in 165 1, when he had reached the ripe age of 

 seventy-three, the " Exercitationes de Generatione " ap- 

 peared. " The rest is silence," save a few letters. In 

 the last of them we have, dated April 24, 1657, he writes 

 to Vlackveld : — 



"Frustra autem calcar mihi addis, ut in aetate hac, 

 non solum matura, sed etiam fessa, ad aliquid noviter 

 moliendum me accingam. Videor enim jam mihi, meo 

 jure, rudem deposcere." 



No man had a better right to claim an honourable 

 discharge from duty. Six weeks later the wished-for 

 release arrived, and on June 3, 



Spectatum satis et donatum jam rude, 

 Harvey died in the eightieth year of his age, full of 

 honours as of years, more than sufiiciently wealthy, and 

 able long before his death, to say that the great truth 

 he had discovered and taught was accepted by all whose 

 opinion was worth having. ^ 



The only works which Harvey published are the 

 famous treatise on the Circulation (1628), with the two 

 letters to Riolan (1649), and the "Exercises on Genera- 

 tion (165 1)." But he was a most diligent observer and 

 writer, and he incidentally refers to a " Disquisition on 

 the Causes and the Organs of Respiration," to " Medical 

 Observations," to a treatise " On the Generation of 

 Insects," and to many observations on Comparative 



1 " Circuitum sanguinis admirabilem, a me jampridem inventum, video 

 propemodum omnibus placuisse : nee ab aliquo quippiam hactenus objectum 

 esse, quod responsum magnopere mereatur. '—Exercitationes dt Getwratione, 

 Ex. lii. 



