SPIRITS OF DESCAKTES. 491 



a mere effect, condition, or property of other 

 matter. On the whole, his views of the ani- 

 mating principle were less accurate than those of 

 Servetus and Harvey, who maintained that it 

 was derived from the atmosphere by respiration, 

 imparted to the blood in the lungs, giving it a 

 bright florid hue, and as possessing the vigour of 

 heat to produce motion.* 



The vital, natural, and animal spirits of Des- 

 cartes and his numerous followers of the 17th 

 century, were identical with the TrvEu/iara of 

 Galen, to which he referred the faculties of 

 generating animal motion, sensation, and intelli- 

 gence, according to the different parts of the 

 system in which they resided, as the thorax, ab- 

 domen, brain, &c. But so ignorant was Galen 

 in regard to the source of animal heat, that he 

 sometimes speaks of it as an inherent condition 

 or property of living bodies, diffused from the 

 heart through the arteries to all parts of the 

 system, in connexion with the pneumata, or 

 spirits; and he supposed that the principal 

 object of respiration was to cool the blood. 

 The same doctrine was taught by Silvius, Fa- 

 bricius, Harvey, Bartholine, Swammerdam* 

 Morozzo, and Cigna ; while Borelli, Boyle, and 

 many others belonging to the mechanical 

 school, down to the time of Haller, maintained 



* The same active principle was recognised by Dr. Henry 

 More, as the spirit of matter, and by many other philosophers 

 of that period as the plastic principle of NATURE. 



