45 



nation of the female by the conception of a " general 

 immaterial idea," we find in him jrealism still very 

 much alive indeed. Had Harvey been content with 

 innate heat he would have done well enough ; but 

 the innate heat of the blood, as he explains it, is 

 not fire nor derived from fire ; nor is the blood 

 occupied by a spirit, but is a spirit : it is also 

 "celestial in nature, the soul, that which answers 

 to the essence of the stars is something analo- 

 gous to heaven, the instrument of heaven." 



In denying that a spirit descends and stows 

 itself in the body, as "an extraneous inmate," 

 Harvey advances beyond Cremoninus, who then 

 taught in the chair of Averroistic philosophy in 

 Padua ; for, says Harvey, I cannot discover this 

 spirit with my senses, nor any seat of it. In another 

 passage indeed Harvey warns us "not to derive 

 from the stars what is in truth produced at home " ; 

 in yet another he tells us that philosophers produce 

 principles as indifferent poets thrust gods upon 

 the stage, to unravel plots and to bring about 

 catastrophes : yet he concludes that " the spirit in 

 the blood acting superiorly to the powers of the 



elements, the soul in this spirit and blood, is 



identical with the essence of the stars." 



