The physiology of the circulation in plants : in the lower animals, and in man : being a course of lectures delivered at surgeons' hall to the president, fellows, etc. of the Royal college of surgeons of Edinburgh, in the summer of 1872 / by J. Bell Pettigrew.

  • Pettigrew, James Bell, 1834-1908.
Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The physiology of the circulation in plants : in the lower animals, and in man : being a course of lectures delivered at surgeons' hall to the president, fellows, etc. of the Royal college of surgeons of Edinburgh, in the summer of 1872 / by J. Bell Pettigrew. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    17/284 (page 5)
    opposite side, and that these in turn contract and force it back again, the blood being made to oscillate transversely across the animal. The celebrated Vesalius examined the subject of the circulation afresh in 1542. He pointed out the difference between the arteries and veins, and showed that the veins and the heart contained valves. He also explained that the arterial pulse depend- ed upon the systole of the heart. Here was a decided advance. Servetus, that martyr to science,1 had, as early as 1531, actually described a pulmonic circulation. He says, Whereas, in the adult, the vital spirit (blood) cannot pass from the right auricle into the left, because of the imperforate nature of the auricular septum, it must go through the lungs, where it is changed, i.e., undergoes a transfor- mation by coming in contact with the vital spirit which resides in the air, after which it returns to the heart. Servetus expressed his belief that the pulmonary artery and vein had some other function than that of nourishing the lungs—an inference deduced from their comparatively large size. Cesalpinus, in 1583, described the pulmonic circulation more carefully than Servetus had done, and showed that he had some knowledge of a double circulation. Nor did the foetal circulation, with its several peculiarities, escape the lynx eyes of the anatomists of the sixteenth century. Galen, as has been pointed out, had a knowledge of the foramen ovale. He had also a partial knowledge of the ductus arteriosus. The ductus arteriosus was carefully de- scribed by Fallopius, Aranzii, and Vesalius. The last observer like- wise discovered the ductus venosus, which was figured by Fabricius and Eustachius. It was reserved, however, for the immortal Harvey to place the coping-stone on the magnificent edifice of the circula- tion, and to this philosopher we owe our knowledge of the circulaton in its entirety, and as at present accepted. Harvey was the apt pupil of a celebrated master. He studied under the famous Fabri- cius of Padua, for the protracted period of six years, viz., from 1596 to 1602. Fabricius, although entirely ignorant of the circulation as subsequently developed and explained by Harvey, had, fortu- nately for Harvey, an intimate knowledge of the valves of the veins, of which he published an account in 1603. From Fabricius, then, the illustrious Harvey derived much of that information which enabled him to astonish the world by his brilliant dis- covery. Harvey, on his return to England, instituted a series of experiments with a view to determine the exact nature and uses of the venous valves. The inquiry was laborious and long; and it was not till the year 1619, i.e., seventeen years after he left Padua, that he ventured to teach the doctrine of the double circulation publicly. Other nine years elapsed before the Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Animalious saw the light. This celebrated work was consequently published in 1628, and, curiously 1 Servetus fell a victim to religious persecution, and was cruelly burned alive at Geneva in 1553.