OF COMPARATIVK ANATOMY, 23 



engaged in zoological and physiological investigations, 

 Mr. Hunter commenced his career. He enjoyed the great 

 advantage, of singular importance to an uneducated and 

 unlearned man, of being initiated in these pursuits by his 

 brother, the most accomplished and learned anatomist, 

 and then the most acute physiologist, of this or any other 

 country. From Dr. W. Hunter, who first taught him, 

 and from the numerous able men brought up in the same 

 school, Mr. Hunter learned in the shortest way whatever 

 could be derived from books, and became acquainted with 

 the labours and discoveries of all other countries *. Thus 

 his genius was excited and invigorated, without being 

 deadened by the toil of study : refreshed by tliese supplies, 

 it became capable of higher and stronger flights, and soared 

 to an elevation, which we cannot estimate justly without 

 taking into consideration the point of departure. Yet he 



« The unrivalled opportunities of education and information enjoyed by 

 Mr. Hunter are very properly stated by the author of the Physiological 

 Lectures^ p. 8. He surprises us afterwards by comparing him to Ferguson 

 the astronomer, who became acquainted with the phenomena of the heavenly 

 bodies, and constructed charts and instruments, while a shepherd's boy. In 

 original instruction, in acquaintance with the most improved state of science, 

 and with the labours of those by whom it had been thus advanced, the two 

 individuals exhibit a complete contrast, instead of resemblance. The repre- 

 sentation that Mr. Hunter was the first in this, or in any country, who studied 

 comparative anatomy and physiology extensively, in order to perfect the 

 knowledge of our own animal economy (Physiol, Lect, p. 5 and 201), seems 

 to me as unfortunate as the comparison of Hunter to Ferguson. Without 

 mentioning Galen, whose labours, although he lived so many centuries ago, 

 ought not to be forgotten ; without enumerating the long list of illustrious 

 men who devoted themselves with so much zeal and success to comparative 

 anatomy and physiology in the iTth century, whose names are connected 

 with all the leading discoveries in those sciences ; an4 whose works oecupy- 

 ing the sixth book of Hauler's Bibliotheca Anatomical under the title of 

 '•^ Animalium Incisiones," contain many of the facts published as new by 

 the moderns ; the name of Hartey immediately suggests itself, as sufficient 

 to refute this assertion. The researches of this great man on the circulation 

 and generation, shew that he was fully aware what assistance might be 

 derived from the dissection and observation of animals in illustrating the 

 structure and functions of man, and that he knew well how to avail himself 

 of it. See Introduction to Comparative Anatomy and Physiology, p. 44 et scq. 



