Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Harveian Oration on Medicine in the Century Before Harvey
Attention must now be devoted to the history of the progress made in the sciences, after the ground had been prepared by the revival of learning. Soon after the begin ning of the sixteenth century a reconsideration was under taken of the data on which the sciences were based, and produced a change in the conceptions hitherto regarded as fixed. The first movement in the direction of progress came from the domain of astronomy, when Copernicus, discarding the Greek system, adopted the heliocentric theory. But his epoch-making work did not see light until 1543, although completed many years before, and its full fruition was postponed until Kepler formulated the laws governing the eclipses towards the end of the century. Botany also began to advance. This subject had remained in a stationary condition, and had been satisfied by the compilation of herbals in which the teaching of the ancients was alone regarded. The first to break away from ancient tradition was Leonicenus, who impugned the authority of Pliny; and he was followed by Fuchs, Gesner, and Caesalpinus, all of whom drew their facts from a study of Nature rather than from books previously compiled. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
