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28 years of age. At this epoch, few medical teachers dared to call in question the doctrines of Galen, and those who did, were considered guilty of something like sacrilege, and doomed to persecution and ruin. When Vesalius, therefore, presumed to consult the book of nature, and to prefer the dictates of reason and experience to the dogmatical tenets of Galen, his noble and independent spirit raised up a multitude of implacable foes, amongst whom were both Eustachius and Sylvius. The latter not only represented him to the world, as guilty of presumption and impiety, but as a madman, whose name should have been, not Vesalius, but Vesanus. In this instance, true merit was overpowered by bigotry and envy, and Vesalius, in order to escape the inquisition, was obliged to undertake a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, in returning from which he was shipwrecked upon the Island of Zante, where he died in extreme poverty.

But, though this illustrious man fell a victim to a most disgraceful persecution, and his labours were interrupted before he was thirty