Page:The Harveian oration delivered at the Royal College of Physicians June 26, 1889 (IA b22361285).pdf/14

 we consider how violently the views of Harvey were opposed, how he was persecuted and ridiculed, and that his practice left him owing to the mistrust of the profession and the public as to his sanity, we may indeed feel grateful that the circulation of the blood is even now an admitted truth, and that we are not deprived of the many and great advantages afforded us by a knowledge of the fact.

The admirably constructed mind of our great discoverer seems to have used in 1615 the method of inductive inquiry so completely systematised by Bacon in 1620. It can scarcely be too often repeated, that the publication of Bacon’s great work did nothing more than exercise a corrective influence over the minds of scientific men; beyond this it was powerless, and the rare qualities which distinguished Harvey were not rendered less essential to the solution of the great problems of nature. The Baconian system may be invaluable to the laborious collector of facts, but it can neither give powers of observation nor originality of conception, and certainly cannot assist us to that enviable