Title-page of Epitome (& Fabrica) of Vesalius (1543).

are the three weasels, the arms of Vesal. The reproduction which I show you here (Fig. 66) is from the "Epitome"-a smaller work issued before [?] the "Fabrica," with rather larger plates, two of which represent nude human bodies and are not reproduced in the great work. The freshest and most beautiful copy is the one on vellum which formerly belonged to Dr. Mead, now in the British Museum, and from it this picture was taken. One of the most interesting features of the book are the full-page illustrations of the anatomy of the arteries, veins and nerves. They had not in those days the art of making corrosion preparations, but they could in some way dissect to their finest ramifications the arteries, veins and nerves, which were then spread on boards and dried. Several such preparations are now at the College of Physicians in London, brought from Padua by Harvey. The plates of the muscles are remarkably good, more correct, though not better perhaps, on the whole, than some of Leonardo's.

Vesalius had no idea of a general circulation. Though he had escaped from the domination of the great Pergamenian in anatomy, he was still his follower in physiology. The two figures annexed (Figs. 67 and 68), taken from one of the two existing copies of the "Tabulæ Anatomicæ," are unique in anatomical illustration, and are of special value as illustrating the notion of the vascular system that prevailed until Harvey's day. I have already called your attention to Galen's view of the two separate systems, one containing the coarse, venous blood for the general nutrition of the body, the other the arterial, full of a thinner, warmer blood with which were distributed the vital spirits and the vital heat. The veins had their origin in the liver; the superior vena cava communicated with the right heart, and, as Galen taught, some blood was distributed to the lungs; but the two systems were closed, though Galen believed there was a communication at the periphery between the arteries and veins. Vesalius accepted Galen's view that there is some communication between the venous and arterial systems through pores in the septum of the ventricles, though he had his doubts, and in the second edition of his book (1555) says that in spite of the authority of the Prince of Physicians he cannot see how the smallest quantity of blood could be transmitted through so dense a muscular septum. Two years before this (1553),* his old fellow student, Michael Servetus, had in his "Christianismi Restitutio" an

See the Servetus Notes in the Osler Anniversary Volumes, New York, 1919, Vol. II.—Ed.

A

FIGS. 67 AND 68.

B

TOACHIMYM ROBLANTS EPIS.

ætas ad quæftum arte parandum immatura,& di fcendi comuniac ftudia prouehendi libido,facilè et leuiter pertulerunt. Vt meã interim præteream dili gentiam,qua tribus integris ut minimum feptima nis, me in publicis-sectionibus uti uiderunt, qui in Italia mihi anatomen docenti adfuêre: quum tamen uno anno in tribus Academijs aliquando id præfti terim.adeo ut fi in hoc tempus fcriptionem diftulis fem, & iam primum coctionem aggrederer, mei Anatomici conatus in ftudioforum manibus haud nerfaretur:quinum recocto Mefue,uel recocto Ga tinaria, uel recocto nefcio cuius Stephani de morbo fum differentijs, eorundemics caufis,& fymptoma tum differentijs,caufis,tabulis,uel demu recocte parti pharmacopolarum Seruitoris, à pofteritate præferentur,nefcio. Quod uero attinet ad Anno tationes, quæ in ingens uolumen excreuerant, illa cum integra in decem libros Rhazes ad Almanfos rem regem paraphrafi, multo diligentius quàm illa quæ in nonum librum proftat à me confcripta, & li bri cuiufdam de mediçamentorum formulis appa fatu(in cuius materiam multa meo fudicio non înus tilia congefferam) una die mihi interierunt,cum om hibus Galeni libris, quibus ego in difcenda anato meufus eram,quosc, ut fit,uariè commaculaueră. Quum enim aulam aditurus,Italiam relinquerem, atc illi quos nofti medici,de meis libris omnibusq qua hodie promouendis ftudijs eduntur,apud Cæ farem,& alios quofdam magnates peffimam fecif fent cenfuram,ca omnia (in pofterum manus facilè a fcribendo cohibiturus) cremaui: etfi nõ femel in terim,eius petulantia me poenituerit, me amicorum,qui aderant,monitis non ftetiffe, doluerim. Quanquam de Annotationibus eo nomine now ᏴᏏ . mediocriter

nounced the lesser circulation. Evidently they had not kept in anatomical touch with one another!

The publication of the "Fabrica" shook the medical world to its foundations. Galen ruled supreme in the schools: to doubt him in the least particular roused the same kind of feeling as did doubts on the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures fifty years ago! His old teachers in Paris were up in arms: Sylvius, nostræ ætatis medicorum decus, as Vesalius calls him, wrote furious letters, and later spoke of him as a madman (væsanus). The younger men were with him and he had many friends, but he had aroused a roaring tide of detraction against which he protested a few years later in his work on the "China-root," which is full of details about the "Fabrica." In a fit of temper he threw his notes on Galen and other MSS. in the fire. Νο sadder page exists in medical writings than the one in which Vesalius tells of the burning of his books and MSS. It is here reproduced and translated. His life for a couple of years is not easy to follow, but we know that in 1546 he took service with Charles V as his body physician, and the greatest anatomist of his age was lost in the wanderings of court and cam23 Epistle on China-root, 1546, p. 196. Vesalius may be quoted in explanation-in palliation: "All these impediments I made light of; for I was too young to seek gain by my art, and I was sustained by my eager desire to learn and to promote the studies in which I shared. I say nothing of my diligence in anatomizing-those who attended my lectures in Italy know how I spent three whole weeks over a single public dissection. But consider that in one year I once taught in three different universities. If I had put off the task of writing till this time; if I were now just beginning to digest my materials; students would not have had the use of my anatomical labours, which posterity may or may not judge superior to the réchauffés formerly in use, whether of Mesua, of Gatinaria, of some Stephanus or other on the differences, causes and symptoms of diseases, or, lastly, of a part of Servitor's pharmacopoeia. As to my notes, which had grown into a huge volume, they were all destroyed by me; and on the same

FIG. 69.

Page from Vesalius' Epistle on
China-root (1546).

23

paigns. He became an active practitioner, a distinguished surgeon, much consulted by his colleagues, and there are references to many of his cases, the most important of which are to internal aneurysms, which he was one of the first to recognize. In 1555 he brought out the second edition of the "Fabrica," an even more sumptuous volume than the first.

There is no such pathetic tragedy in the history of our profession. Before the age of thirty Vesalius had effected a revolution in anatomy; he became the valued physician of the greatest court of Europe; but call no man happy till he is dead! A mystery surrounds his last days. The story is that he had obtained permission to perform a post-mortem examination on the body of a young Spanish nobleman, whom he had attended. When the body was opened, the spectators to their horror saw the heart beating, and there were signs of life! Accused, so it is said, by the Inquisition of murder and also of general impiety he only escaped through the intervention of the King, with the condition that he make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. In carrying this out in 1564 he was wrecked on the island of Zante, where he died of a fever or of exhaustion, in the fiftieth year of his age.

To the North American Reviere, November, 1902, Edith Wharton contributed a poem on "Vesalius in Zante," in which she pictures his life, so full of accomplishment, so full of regrets-regrets accentuated by the receipt of an anatomical treatise by Fallopius, the successor to the chair in Padua! She makes him say:

There are two ways of spreading light; to be

The candle or the mirror that reflects it.

I let my wiek burn out there yet remains

To spread an answering surface to the flame
That others kindle.

day there similarly perished the whole of my paraphrase on the ten books of Rhares to King Ahmanson, which had been composed by me with far more care than the ore which is prefaced to the with book With these abp went the books of some author or other on the formule and preparation of medic mes, to which I had added much matter of my own which I judged to be wot without wt2ty, and the same tate overtook all the books of Galen which I had used in iperning anatomith, and which I had ¿beviljy, divigureel in the woral fadion. I was on the point at laying Italy and ging to Copt, those party ane you know of bad made to the Emperor and to the mobox a must unrevomisable wasnt at my books and at all that a published novadox to the peymotion et study, 1 Powetore burst all the mesh shat I have mentioned. Pkg at the vente trase that it would be at next meter & æble» the wing for the ሰኒ I wat Now that 1 Soe cap repetal pop then me way sentent and regretted that I did not take the shove de pe 1 pond w