man more capable of writing about great discoveries
than of making them himself. This was Piccolomini, who devoted himself
to showing how much the ancients had taught about anatomy, though at
the same time he also made clear the place occupied by modern
anatomical discoveries. While his name is not attached to any great
discovery in the science of anatomy, he is generally acknowledged to
have been one of the great teachers of his time and one who was needed
just then in order to make people realize how the old and the new in
anatomy must be coordinated. Piccolomini's successor in the chair of
anatomy at Rome was another original genius and investigator whose
name, however, and fame has never been as great among English-speaking
people as in Italy, or among the Latin races generally. The fact that
he was a rival {236} of Harvey's in the matter of the discovery of the
circulation of the blood has always made the Italians exaggerate his
position in medical history, while it has undoubtedly made English
writers of medical history diminish the importance of his work.

Historians of science consider him worthy to be called the greatest
living scientist of his time--the end of the sixteenth century. He was
not only a scientific physician, but he was an authority in all the
sciences related to medicine, and indeed had profound interests in
every branch of physical science. His contemporaries looked up to him
as a leader in scientific thought. To anyone who examines the question
of the discovery of the circulation of the blood with freedom from
bias, there can be no doubt but that the honor for this discovery has
been unduly taken away from Caesalpinus in English-speaking countries,
to be conferred solely on Harvey. Not that there is any wish to lessen
the value of Harvey's magnificent original work, nor make little of
his wonderful powers of observation, nor of the marvelous experimental
and logical method by which he followed out his thoughts to their
legitimate conclusion, but that I would insist on giving honor where
honor is due, though most writers in English refuse to give
Caesalpinus's claims a proper share of attention.

The Italians have always declared that Caesalpinus was the real
discoverer of the circulation, and there is no doubt that his career
occurs just at that point in the evolution of the medical sciences,
and especially anatomy and physiology in Italy, where this discovery
would naturally come. Lest it sho