Page:The Harveian oration 1905.djvu/15

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THE HARVEIAN ORATION.
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various and glowing terms. Thus, it has been spoken of as "the most momentous event in the history of medicine since the time of Galen"; as the "foundation stone of scientific medicine"; as "a new power which afforded a point of new departure, becoming the central idea dominating and enshrined by medical knowledge for all time"; and as "inaugurating the era of rational medicine and reconstituting the face of physiology." To us of more mature years who can look back upon and realise in some degree the marvellous progress which has been made since Harvey's time in physiology, pathology, and scientific and practical medicine and surgery, these expressions appear in no way exaggerated, for they but declare the absolute and solemn truth. I wonder whether the modern medical student, to whom the "circulation of the blood" is one of the most elementary and familiar facts impressed upon his youthful and receptive brain almost at the outset of his career, ever gives a thought to the discoverer or to the grandeur of his discovery, or has the faintest notion of where we should have been as a profession had it not been for this stupendous epoch in the history and progress of scientific investigation and knowledge? Nor must we forget the formidable difficulties under which Harvey carried out his investigations, and established on a sure foundation the great revelation which no doubt had previously impressed itself on his active and eager brain; the profound errors