54 Harvey and the Circulation. [lect. ii 



the brilliant Venetian, theologian, philosopher, and martyr. 

 Sarpi studied anatomy as indeed he studied all the sciences of 

 his time, and he studied it under Fabricius. Now, one Thomas 

 Cornelius Consentinus is the author of the story that Sarpi, 

 while he was studying at Padua arrived at conclusions con- 

 cerning the circulation of the blood identical with those of 

 Harvey, conclusions developed in a manuscript found among 

 his papers after his death. The story goes on to say that Sarpi 

 had made known his conclusions to his master Fabricius, who 

 did not himself think much of them, but told his pupil Harvey 

 about them ; and Harvey going home to England published 

 them as his own. 



But Ent in his Apologia gives a very different version. 

 He says that the Venetian Legate returning from London to 

 Venice carried with him a copy of Harvey's book, which had 

 just appeared. This copy he lent to Sarpi, and the latter was 

 so struck with the new views that he transcribed for his own 

 use very much of the lent book. It was this transcription of 

 Harvey which Sarpi's heirs found among his papers after his 

 death. 



All such attempts to take away from Harvey what is his 

 due are vain and useless efforts. The greatness of all great 

 men is partly built on the worth of those who have gone before. 

 In science no man's results are wholly his own, like other living 

 things they come from something which lived before. Vesalius, 

 Servetus, Fabricius and the rest led up to Harvey; but they 

 were not Harvey. He was himself, and his greatness is in no 

 wise lessened by its having come through them. 



