LINKAGE WITH THE MODERN TIME 



From Galen we leap forward to his would- 

 be overthrower, Paracelsus, who cast off the 

 old theories, yet reached back his hand to 

 Hippocrates as a wise practitioner and pro- 

 found observer of the courses of disease, like 

 Paracelsus himself! His younger contempo- 

 rary, Vesalius, investigating with his own hands 

 and eyes, rejected much of the old anatomy, 

 and apparently troubled himself little with 

 medical theory. But Harvey — to mention 

 only one feature of the working of this great 

 intelligence — was harassed by the craving to 

 reconcile the circulation of the blood with the 

 Aristotelian physiology or teleology of the nat- 

 ural parts of man. And if Harvey's dis- 

 covery of the systemic circulation appears as 

 the fruit of investigation and experiment, his 

 pregnant contribution to the theory, or knowl- 

 edge, of generation was in itself an hypothesis 

 (acceptable no longer!), to wit: omne vivum 

 ex ovo. 



Practice and theory! medicine must have 

 both; and when clinical experience has taught 

 its lessons, the microscope and laboratory be- 

 come the chief means of medical advance. The 

 wise practitioner, though he turn his mind from 

 theorizing, will still be he who proceeds upon 

 some sane working hypothesis. 



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