Dr. J. H. Bridges, of the Local Government Board, delivered the Harveian oration on October 20th, 1892, at the Royal College of Physicians. Dr. Bridges said: “In his discovery William Harvey employed every method of biological research, direct observation, experiment, above all the great Aristotelian method of comparison to which he himself attributes his success. His manuscript notes show how freely he used it. They show that he had dissected no less than eighty species of animals. It is sometimes said that experimentation on living animals was the principal process of discovery. This I believe to be an exaggerated view, though such experiments were effective in convincing others of the discovery when made. It need not be said that no ethical problem connected with this matter was recognised in Harvey’s time. The first to recognise such a problem was that great and successful experimenter, deep thinker, and humane man, Sir Charles Bell. What were the effects of Harvey’s discovery? It was assuredly the most momentous event in medical history since the time of Galen. It was the first attempt to show that the processes of the human body followed or accompanied each other by laws as certain and precise as those which Kepler and Galileo were revealing in the solar system or on the earth’s surface. Henceforth it became clear that all laws of force and energy that operated in the inorganic world were applicable to the human body.”
The case for Harvey’s originality is well put by the author of the article on Harvey in the Dictionary of National Biography. “The modern controversy as to whether the discovery was taken from some previous author is sufficiently refuted by the opinion of the opponents of his views in his own time, who agreed in denouncing the doctrine as new; by the laborious method of gradual demonstration obvious in his book and lectures; and lastly, by the complete absence of lucid demonstration of the action of the heart and course of the blood in Cæsalpinus, Servetus, and all others who have been suggested as possible originals of the discovery. It remains to this day the greatest of the discoveries of physiology, and its whole honour belongs to Harvey.”
“That there is one blood stream, common to both arteries and veins, that the blood poured into the right auricle passes into the right ventricle, that it is from there forced by the contraction of the ventricular walls along the pulmonary artery through the lungs and pulmonary veins to the left auricle, that it then passes into the left ventricle to be distributed through the aorta to every part of the animal body; and that the heart is the great propeller of this perpetual motion, as in a circle. This is the great truth of the motion of the heart and blood, commonly called the circulation, and must for ever remain the glorious legacy of William Harvey to rational physiology and medicine in every land.”[900]
Harvey explains how he was led to his great discovery: “When I first gave my mind to vivisections as a means of discovering the motions and uses of the heart, and sought to discover these from actual inspection, and not from the writings of others, I found the task so truly arduous, so full of difficulties, that I was almost tempted to think with Frascatorius, that the motion of the heart was only to be comprehended by God. For I could neither rightly perceive at first when the systole and when the diastole took place, nor when and where dilatation and contraction occurred, by reason of the rapidity of the motion, which in many animals is accomplished in the twinkling of an eye, coming and going like a flash of lightning; so that the systole presented itself to me now from this point, now from that; the diastole the same; and then everything was reversed, the motions occurring, as it seemed, variously and confusedly together. My mind was therefore greatly unsettled, nor did I know what I should myself conclude, nor what believe from others. I was not surprised that Andreas Laurentius should have written that the motion of the heart was as perplexing as the flux and reflux of Euripus had appeared to Aristotle. At length, and by using greater diligence and investigation, making frequent inspection of many and various animals, and collating numerous observations, I thought that I had attained to the truth, that I should extricate myself and escape from this labyrinth, and that I had discovered what I so much desired, both the motion and the use of the heart and arteries.”[901]
John Locke (1632-1704). The great philosopher was a thoroughly educated physician engaged in the practice of medicine. He was the friend of Sydenham, whose principles he defended and whose works are doubtless permeated with the thoughts of the author of the famous treatise on the Human Understanding. In a letter of Locke’s to W. Molyneux he says: “You cannot imagine how far a little observation carefully made by a man not tied up to the four humours [Galen], or sal, sulphur, and mercury [Paracelsus], or to acid and alkali [Sylvius and Willis], which has of late prevailed, will carry a man in the curing of diseases, though very stubborn and dangerous; and that with very little and common things, and almost no medicine at all.” Locke declared that we have no innate ideas, but that all our knowledge is derived from experience. The acquirement of knowledge is due to the investigation of things by the bodily senses.
Surgery about this period began to flourish in England. Richard Wiseman (1625-1686), the “Father of English Surgery,” was in the royal service from Charles I. to James II. His military experience greatly assisted him in his profession. He treated aneurism by compression, practised “flap-amputation,” and laid down rules for operating for hernia.
James Primrose, M.D. (died 1659), was a voluminous writer who opposed the teaching of Harvey on the circulation of the blood.
Baldwin Hamey, jun., M.D., was the most munificent of all the benefactors of the London College of Physicians. He was lecturer on Anatomy at the College in 1647, and a voluminous writer, though he published little or nothing.
Francis Glisson, M.D. (died 1677), was one of the first of the group of anatomists in England who, incited by Harvey’s example, devoted themselves to enthusiastic research. His account of the cellular envelope of the portal vein in his work De Hepate, published in 1654, has immortalised his name in the designation “Glisson’s capsule.” He wrote a work on rickets, De Rachitide seu Morbo Puerili. Glisson ascribed to the lymphatic vessels the function of absorption.
Jonathan Goddard, M.D. (died 1674), frequented the meetings which gave birth to the Royal Society. He was a good chemist, and invented the famous volatile drops known on the Continent as the Guttæ Anglicanæ. He made the first telescope ever constructed in this country.