Page:The Harveian oration delivered at the Royal College of Physicians June 26, 1889 (IA b22361285).pdf/45

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47

industriously, but whose work indicates in the most unequivocal manner his incapacity to determine the nature of the pathological conditions which he attempted to combat with his remedies.

There was then but little reason in the view that therapeutics would be affected by Harvey’s discovery; but we need not be surprised that the belief was encouraged, and that he lost his practice.

The honourable position he occupied angered the ambitious—his bold honesty offended the deceitful, and his growing fortune tempted the covetous.

And now we find him complaining, not, indeed, of decreasing wealth, but of the unworthy treatment received from those who ought to have loved and protected him. In his work on Generation[1] we find the following lines: ‘And whilst I speak of these matters, let gentle minds forgive me, if recalling the irreparable injuries I have suffered, I here give vent to a sigh. This is the cause of my sorrow: whilst in attendance on his Majesty the King, during our late troubles and more than

  1. Willis’s Translation of Harvey’s Works (Sydenham Society), p. 481.