An anatomical disquisition on the motion of the heart & blood in animalsHarvey, William
Science
An anatomical disquisition on the motion of the heart & blood in animals
Harvey, William
Blood -- Circulation
But these matters will be better spoken of in my observations on
the formation of the fœtus, where many propositions, the following
among the number, will be discussed: Wherefore is this part formed or
perfected first, that last?--and of the several members: what part
is the cause of another? And many points having special reference to
the heart, such as: Wherefore does it first acquire consistency, and
appear to possess life, motion, sense, before any other part of the
body is perfected, as Aristotle says in his third book, De partibus
Animalium? And so also of the blood: Wherefore does it precede all the
rest? And in what way does it possess the vital and animal principle?
And show a tendency to motion, and to be impelled hither and thither,
the end for which the heart appears to be made? In the same way, in
considering the pulse: Wherefore one kind of pulse should indicate
death, another recovery? And so of all the other kinds of pulse, what
may be the cause and indication of each. So also in the consideration
of crises and natural critical discharges; of nutrition, and especially
the distribution of the nutriment; and of defluxions of every
description. Finally, reflecting on every part of medicine, physiology,
pathology, semeiotics, therapeutics, when I see how many questions can
be answered, how many doubts resolved, how much obscurity illustrated,
by the truth we have declared, the light we have made to shine, I
see a field of such vast extent in which I might proceed so far,
and expatiate so widely, that this my tractate would not only swell
out into a volume, which was beyond my purpose, but my whole life,
perchance, would not suffice for its completion.
In this place, therefore, and that indeed in a single chapter, I shall
only endeavour to refer the various particulars that present themselves
in the dissection of the heart and arteries to their several uses and
causes; for so I shall meet with many things which receive light from
the truth I have been contending for, and which, in their turn, render
it more obvious. And indeed I would have it confirmed and illustrated
by anatomical arguments above all others.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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