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of the living heart and arteries—others were experiments in the modern and restricted use of the word. These were Harvey’s methods, as they must be the methods of all Natural Science. First, observation; next, reflection; then experiment. “Don’t think; try,” was Hunter’s advice to Jenner; an advice that is often needed by an acute and speculative genius like his; still more often by sheer idleness, that will never bring its fancies to the test of fact.[1]
Experiments without hypotheses are often fruitless, but hypotheses which are never brought to the test of experiment are positively mischievous.
(c) How far have the Fellows of this College obeyed Harvey’s precept and followed his example in “searching out the Secrets of Nature by way
of experiment.” We must, I fear, confess that
- ↑ Ea autem vera esse vel falsa, Sensus nos facere debet certiores, non Ratio; avroxpia non mentis agitatio.—Second Epistle to Riolanus, p. 133. (College edition.)
