Page:The Hunterian oration, for the year 1819.djvu/20

16 Vesalius in France. Vesalius pursued his anatomical enquiries with so much ardor and constancy, that he was able to publish seven large folio volumes on the anatomy of the human body, before he was 29 years of age (1542). These books, which entitle him to the greatest gratitude of posterity, were to himself, however, the cause of much vexation and trouble. Even at that time, the authority of Galen was held in such high respect, that when Vesalius showed his errors, and his ignorance of the structure of the human body, the hatred of all was turned against the defamer. People could not bear to be set right by so young a man, and even his preceptor Sylvius denounced perpetual enmity against him. I need not tell my present auditors what scrapes Vesalius got into, or what injuries he sustained, in consequence of the public prejudice against dissection.

After human anatomy had become moderately well known, the different nations of Europe were involved in war, and the same attention was not paid to the support of academical institutions, for teaching