LECTURE III. 



BORELLI AND THE INFLUENCE OF THE 

 NEW PHYSICS. 



Harvey's method of inquiry was that which may be called 

 the purely or strictly physiological method. Observing care- 

 fully the phenomena of the living body, he sought in the first 

 place, in the arrangements of the structures concerned in the 

 facts of anatomy, for suggestions as to how the phenomena 

 might be explained. It is this aspect of his method which 

 brings into striking light the value of the work of Vesalius and 

 of the school of Vesalius as the necessary preparation for 

 Harvey's labours. Vesalius opened up the way for physio- 

 logical inquiry by his exact anatomical labours, but as we have 

 seen left the physiological plough almost as soon as he had put 

 his hand to it. And his successors did little more than widen 

 the way which he had opened up. -^Harvey was the first who 

 followed up the anatomical path till it led to a great physio- 

 logical truth.^ 



Having made sure of the anatomical facts and having grasped 

 the suggestions which these offered, he proceeded at once to test 

 those suggestions by experiments on living animals. It was as 

 he himself has said through many vivisections that he was led 

 to truth. 



■^ He made no a p peal to any k nowledge or to a ny conceptions^ 

 outside the facts of anatomy and the results of experime nts.^ 

 Though few at that time could speak of the processes of living 

 bodies without bringing in the actions of spirits, natural, vital, 



