A sketch of Vesalius's career will give the best possible idea of the influences at work in science during this Golden Age of anatomical discovery, and will at the same time serve to show better than anything else, how {100} utterly unfounded is the opinion that there was opposition between religion, or theology and science, and above all medical science, at this time. On the other hand, it will demonstrate that the educational factors at work in Vesalius's time were not different from those of the preceding century, nor indeed from those that had existed for two or three centuries before his time; and though his magnificent original research introduced the new initiative which always comes after a genius has left his mark upon a scientific department, the spirit in which science was pursued after his time did not differ essentially from that which had prevailed before. He represents not a revolution in medical science, as has so often been said, though always with the purpose of demonstrating how much the so-called reformation accomplished in bringing about this great progress in anatomy, but only a striking epoch in that gradual evolution which had already advanced so far that his work was rendered easy and some such climax of progress as came in his time was inevitable. Vesalius's earlier education was received entirely in his native town of Louvain. There were certain preparatory schools in connection with the university at Louvain, and to one of these, called Paedagogium Castri because of the sign over the door, which was that of a fort, Vesalius was sent. Here he learned Latin and Greek and some Hebrew. How well he learned his Latin can be realized from the fact that at twenty-two he was ready to lecture in that language on anatomy in Italy. His knowledge of Greek can be estimated from the tradition that he could translate Galen at sight, and he was known to have corrected a number of errors in translations from that author made by preceding {101} translators. To those who know the traditions of that time in the teaching of the classic languages along the Rhine and in the Low Countries, these accomplishments of Vesalius will not be surprising. They knew how to teach in those pre-reformation days, and probably Latin and Greek have never been better taught than by the Brethren of the Common Life, whose schools for nearly a hundred years had been open in the Low Countries and Rhenish Germany for the children of all classes, but especially of the poor. Other schools in the same region could scarcely fail to be uplifted by such educational traditions. Altogether, Vesalius spent some nine years in the Paedagogium.