the blood be again returned to that place where it first began that is to say to the right ear These things you may try at your pleasure cutting up one of the longer arteries as the jugular which if you take betwixt your fingers you shall clearly discern how it loses its pulse and recovers it again beats lesse or more And as these things may be tryed whilst the brest is whole so opening the brest and the lungs afterwards being collaps'd and all motion of respiration gone you may easily try it to wit that the left ear is contracted and emptyed that it becomes more whitish and that it doth at last together with the left ventricle intermit in its pulse beat leisurely and at last leave off And likewise by the hole which you may cut in the arterie you may see the blood come forth lesse and lesse in a smaller thred and that at last to wit in the defect of blood and the impulsion of the left ventricle no more will flow You may likewise try this same in the tying of the vena arteriosa and so take away the pulse of the left ear and with untying it restore the pulse at your pleasure Whence the same thing is evidently try'd by experiment which is seen in dying persons that as first the left ventricle desists from motion and pulse and afterwards the left ear then the right ventricle pulse lastly the right ear so where the vital faculty begins first it ends last Which being tried by the sense it is manisest that the blood passes only through the semptum of the heart and not through the lungs and only through them whilst they are mov'd in respiration and not when they are fallen or disquieted For which cause in an Embryon not as yet breathing Nature instead of the passage in the arteria venosa that matter may be furnish'd to the left ventricle and the left ear opens an oval hole which she shuts in young men and those that breath freely It likewise appears why those that have the vessels of their lungs oppress'd and stuff'd or those that have any losse of their breath it is present token of death It is likewise clear why the blood of the lungs is so flame-colour'd for it is thinnest that is straind through there It is beside to be observ'd from our former conclusion in order to those who require the causes of Circulation think the power of the heart to be the effecter of all things and as it is the author of transmission by pulse so with Aristotle they think it the author of attraction and generation of blood and that the Spirits are made by the heart and the influxive heat that by the innat heat of the heart as by the immediat instrument of the soul or by a common bond and the first organ for perfecting of all the works of life And so the motion of the blood and spirit its perfection and heat and every property thereof to be borrow'd from the heart as from its beginning which Arist. says is in in the blood as in hot water or boyling pottage is in the heart and that it is the first cause of pulsation and life If I may speak freely I do not think that these things are so as they are commonly believed for there are many things which perswade me to that opinion which I will take notice of in the generation of creatures which are not fit here to be rehersed but it may be things more wonderful than these and such as will give more light to natural Philosophie shall be publish'd by me Yet in the mean time I will say and propound it without demonstration with the leave of most learned men and reverence to antiquity that the heart as it is the beginning of all things in the body the spring fountain and first causer of life is so to be taken as being joynd together with the veins and all arteries and the blood which is containd in thē Like as the brain together with all its sensible nervs organs and spinal marrow is the adequate organ of the sense as the phrase is But if you understand by this word heart the body of the heart with the ventricles and ears I do not think it to be the framer of the blood and that it has not force vertue motion or heat as the gift of the heart and next that the same is not the cause of the Diastole distention which is the cause of the Systole and contraction whether in the ears or arteries but that part of the pulse which is call'd a Diastole comes of another cause diverse from the Systole and ought to go before every Systole I think the first cause of distention is innate heat in the blood it self which like leaven by little and little attenuated and swelling is the last thing that is extinct in the creature I agree to Aristotles instance of pottage or milk in so far as he thinks that elevation or depression of the blood does not come of vapours or exhalations or Spirits rais'd into a vaporous or eareal form nor is not caus'd by any external agent but by the regulating of Nature an internal principle Nor is the heart as some think like a charcoal-fire like a hot Kettle the beginning of heat and blood but rather the blood delivers that heat which it has receiv'd to the heart as likewise to all the rest of the parts as being the hottest of all Therefore arteries and the coronal veins are assign'd to the heart for that use which they are assign'd to the rest of the parts to wit for influx of heat for the entertaining and conservation of it therefore all the hotter parts how much more sanguine they are and more abundant with blood they are said convertibly so to be and thus the heart having signall concavities is to be thought the Ware-house continuall fire and fountain of the blood not because of the corpulency of it but because of the blood which it contains like a hot Kettle as in the same manner the spleen lungs an other parts are thought hot because they have many veins or vessels containing blood And after this manner do I believe that the native heat call'd innate to be the first efficient cause of pulse as likewise to be the common instrument of all operations This as yet I do not constantly aver but propound it as a Thesis I would fain know what may be objected by good and learned men without scurrilitie of words reproaches or base language and any body shall be welcome to do it These things then are as it were the parts and the footsteps of the passage and Circulation of the blood to wit from the right ear into the ventricle out of the ventricle through the lungs into the left ear then into the left ventricle into the aorta and into all the arteries from the heart by the porosities of the part into the veins and by the veins
the impulsion of the blood For so soon as above the reed or pipe you have with a band tyed the arterie the arterie above the ligature is presently dilated by the impulsion of the blood beyond the mouth of the pipe from whence both the flux is stop'd and the impulsion reverberated so that the arterie under the band does beat with very little appearance because the force of the passage of the blood does no way assist it because it is return'd above the ligature but if the arterie the cut off below the pipe you shall see the contrary from the leaping of the blood which is thrown out and driven through the pipe as in an Aneurism I have observ'd to come fró the exesion of the tunicles of the arterie this whilst the blood is containd within the membranes hath a contentive vessel of its flux praenaturally made not of the dilated tunicles of the arterie but of the circumposition of the membrane and flesh You shall see the inferiour arteries beyond this Aneurism beat very weakly whilst above and especially in the Aneurism it self the pulsations appear great and vehement although we cannot there imagine that the impulse or dilatation is made by the tunicles of the arteries or by communication of the faculty of the Cyst but meerly by the impulsion of the blood But that the error of Vesalius and the small experience of others may the more clearly appear who affirm as they imagine that the part under the pipe does not beat when the band is tyed I speak by experience if you make the experiment rightly that it will and whereas they say that upon the untying the band the arteries below xdo beat backwards I say that the part below beats lesse when you have untyed it then when it is tyed But the effusion of blood which leaps out of the wound confuses all and makes the experiment vain and to no purpose so that there can be no certainty demonstrated as I said by reason of the blood But if and this I know by experience you lay open the arterie and hold with your finger close that part which you cut you may at your pleasure try many things which will evidently make the truth appear to you First you shall feel the blood being forc'd comming down into the arterie by which you shall see the arterie dilated as likewise you may squeez out and let go the blood as you please If you open a little part of the orifice and look narrowly to it you shall see the blood at every pulse to be thrown out with a leaping and as we said in the opening of an arterie or in the perforation of the heart you shall see the blood to be thrown out in every contraction of the heart in the dilatation of the arterie But if you suffer it to flow with a constant and continuall flux and give it leave to break out either through the pipe or by the open orifice in the streaming of it both by your sight and by your touch you shall find all the stroaks order vehemency and intermission of the heart just as you might feel in the pulse of your hand water squirted through a syringe at divers and severall shootings so you may perceive both by your sight and by its motion the blood leaping out with a varying and unequall force I have seen it sometimes in the cutting of the jugular arterie break out with such force that the blood being forc'd against the hand did by its reverberation and refraction flye back four or five foot But that this doubt may be more clear that the pulsifick force does not flow through the Tunicles of the arteries from the hoant I have a little piece of the arterie descendant together with two crurall branches of it about the length of a span taken out of the body of a very worthy Gentleman which turn'd to be a bone like a pipe by the hollow of which whilst this worthy Gentleman was alive the blood in its descent to the feet did agitate the arteries by its impulsion in which case neverthelesse although the arterie were in the same condition as if it had been bound or tyed above the little conduit-pipe according to the experiment of Galen that it could not either be dilalated in that place nor streightned like a pair of bellowes nor from the heart derive its pulsifick force to the inferior and lesser arteries nor yet carry through the solid substance of the bones that faculty which it had not receiv'd yet I very well remember that I often observ'd whilst he was alive that the pulse of the inferiour arterie did move in his legs and feet wherefore it must needs follow that in in that worthy Gentleman the inferiour arteries were dilated by the impulsion of the blood like baggs and not like bellows by the stretching of the tunicles For there must needs arrive the same inconvenience and interception of the pulsifick faculty the tunicle of the arterie being wholly converted into a conduit or pipe of bone as might arrive from the reed or pipe which was tyed that the arterie might not beat I knew likewise in another worthy and gallant Gentleman the aorta and a part of the great arterie near the heart turn'd into a round bone So Galens experiment or at least one answerable to it being not found out by industry was found out by chance and does manifestly evidence that the interception of the pulsifick faculty is not intercepted by the construction or ligature of the Tunicles so that by that means the arteries cannot beat and if the experiment which Galen prescribes were rightly perform'd by any it would refute the opinion which Vesalius thought from thence to have confirm'd Yet for this cause do we not deny all motion to the tunicles of the arteries but do attribute that to it which we grant to the heart namely that there is a coarctation and a Systole in the tunicles themselves and from their distension a regress to their naturall constitution But if this is to be observ'd that they are not dilated and streightned for the same cause nor by the same instrument but by severall as you may observe in the motion of all the parts and in the heart it is distended by the ear contracted by it self so the arteries are dilated by the heart and fall of themselves So you may make another experiment after the same manner If you fill two sawcers of the same measure one of them with arterial blood which leaps out the the other with venal blood drawn out of a vein of the same Animal you may presently by your sense and afterwards too when both the bloods are grown cold observe what is the difference betwixt both the bloods against those who do fancy another sort of blood in the arteries than is in the veins namely they do ascribe to the veins a fresher sort of blood I doe not know which way boyling or blown up swelling or bubbling
like to honey or milk upon the fire and so taking up more room For if the blood which is driven out of the left ventricle into the arteries should be leaven'd so as to be blown up and foam after that manner so that a drop or two should fill all the concavity of the aorta no doubt it would when it fell again return to the quantity of some few drops which cause some do allege for the emptiness of the arteries in dead men and the same would be seen in the cotyla full of arterial blood for so we find that it comes to passe in the cooling of milk or honey But if in either cotyla the blood be found of the same colour and congealed of a not much different consistence and squeezing out the whey after the same manner and if it take up the same room both when it is hot and when it is cold I think it will be a sufficient argument to gain any mans beleef and to confute the dreams of some that there is neither in the left ventricle and sort of blood differing from that of the right as you may find out both by sense and reason for you must needs likewise affirm that the vena arteriosa should equally be distended with one drop of blood foaming up and therefore that there is just such bubbling and leaven'd blood in the right as in the left seeing the entry of the vena arteriosa and the egresse of the aorta is equipollent and equall Three things are chiefly ready to breed this opinion of the diversity of blood One is that in the cutting of an arterie they see brighter blood drawn out Another is that in the dissection of dead bodies they find both the left ventricle of the heart and all the arteries so empty A third is that they imagine that the arterial blood is more spirituous and more replete with Spirits and therefore they think that it takes up more room The cause and reason of all which things why they come to be so by inspection is perceiv'd First insomuch as concerns the colour alwayes and every where blood comming through a narrow hole is as as it were strained and becomes thinner and the lighter part of it and which swims above and is more penetrable is thrust out so in Phlebotomie the blood which springs out with great flux or force and out of a greater orifice and flies further is alwayes thicker fuller and darker colour'd but if it flow drops as it does out of a vein when the ligature is unty'd it is brighter for it is straind as it were and only the thinner part comes out as in the bleeding at nose or that which is extracted by Leeches or Cupping-glasses or any way issuing by diapedesin is always seen more bright because the thicknesse and hardnesse of the tunicles becomes more impassible nor yeelds so pliably as to give an open way for the comming out of the blood As it likewise happens in fat bodies when by the fat under the skin the orifice of the vein is stop'd then the blood appears thinner brighter and as if it did flow from an arterie On the contrary if you receive in a sawcer the blood when you have cut an arterie if it flow freely it shall appear like venal blood there is blood much brighter in the lungs and squeez'd out from thence than any is found in the arteries The emptinesse of the arteries in dead bodies which did perchance cozen Erasistrasus insomuch that he thought that the arteries containd only aerial spirits proceeds from hence because that when the lungs fall their passages being stopt the lungs do breath no longer so that the blood cannot freely passe through them yet the heart continues a while in its expulsion whence both the left ventricle of the heart is more contracted and the arteries likewise empty and not fill'd by succession of blood appear empty But if the heart cease both at one time and the lungs to give passage by respiration as it is in those who are drowned in cold water or in those who are taken suddenly with unexpected death you shall find both the veins and the arteries full As concerning the third of the Spirits what they are and of what consistence and how they are in the body whether they be apart and distinct from the solid parts or mix'd with them there are so many and so divers opinions that it is no wonder if Spirits whose nature is left so doubtfull do serve for a common escape to ignorance For commonly ignorant persons when they cannot give a reason for any thing they say presently that it is done by Spirits and bring in Spirits as performers in all cases and like as bad Poets doe bring in the gods upon the Scene by head and ears to make the Exit and Catastrophe of their play Fernelius and others do imagine aerial Spirits and invisible substances for he proves that there are animal Spirit just as Erasistratus proves them in the arteries because there are little cells in the brains which are empty and since there is no vacuum he concludes that in living men they are full of Spirits Yet all the School of Physicians agrees upon three sorts of Spirits that the natural Spirits flow through the veins the vital through the arteries and the animal through the nerves whence the Physicians say out of Galen that the parts sometimes want the cōsent of the brain because the faculty together with its essence is sometimes hinder'd and sometime without the essence Over and above besides these three sorts of influxive spirtis they seem to assert so many more which are implanted But none of all these have we found by dissection neither in the veins nerves arteries nor parts of living persons Some make corporeal Spirits other some incorporeal Spirits and those who make corporeal spirits sometimes say that the blood or thinnest part of the blood is the conjunction of the soul with the body sometimes they say that the Spirits are containd in the blood as flame in smoke and sustain'd by the perpetuall flux of it sometimes they do distinguish them from the blood Those that affirm that there are Spirits incorporeal know not how to tread but likewise doe affirm that there are potential Spirits as Spirits concoctive chilificative procreative and so many Spirits as there are faculties or parts But the Schoolmen tell us also of a Spirit of Fortitude Prudence Patience and of all the vertues and the most holy Spirit of wisdom and all divine gifts They think too that bad and good Spirits do assist possess leave and wander abroad They think also that diseases are caus'd by a Devil as by a Cacochima But although there is nothing more uncertain and doubtfull than the doctrine which is assign'd to us concerning the spirit yet for the most part all Physicians seem with Hippocrates to conclude that our bodies are made up of three parts containing containd and enforcing by
when it is cold We see that the passion of the mind in the administration of Phlebotomie if any fearfull person chance to sound streight the flux of the blood is stopp'd and a bloodless palenesse seases on all the superfice of his body his members are stiff his ears sing his eyes grow dim and are in convulsion I find here a field where I might run our further and exspatiate at large in speculation But from hence so great a light of truth appears from which so many questions may be resolv'd so many doubts answered so many causes and cures of diseases found out that they seem to require a particular treatise Concerning all which in my medicinal observations I 'll set down things worthy your admiration For what is more admirable than that in all affections desires hope or fear our bodies suffer severall ways our very countenances are changed and our blood is seen to fly up and down with anger our eyes are red the black of the eye is lessen'd in shamefastnesse and the cheeks are flush'd with rednesse by fear infamie and shame the face is pale the ears glow as if they should hear sone ill thing young men that are touch'd with lust how quickly is their nerve fill'd with blood erected and extended But it is most worthy the observation of Physicians why blood-letting and cupping glasses and the stopping of the arterie which carries the flux especially whilst they are doing does as it were with a charm take away all pain and grief I say such things as these are to be referred to observations where they are explained clearly Frivolous and unexperienced persons do scurvily strive to overthrow by logicall and far-fetch'd arguments or to establish such things as are meerly to be confirm'd a by Anatomicall dissection and ocular testimony It behoves him who ever is desirous to learn to see any thing which is in question if it be obvious to sense and sight whether it be so or no or else be bound to believe those that have made tryall for by no other clearer or more evident certainty can he learn or be taught Who will perswade a man that has not tasted them that sweet or new wine is better than water with what arguments shall one perswade a blind man that the Sun is clear and out-shines all the Stars in the firmament So concerning the Circulation of the blood which all have had confirm'd to them for so many years by so many ocular experiments there has been hitherto no man found who by his observations could refute a thing so obvious to the sense to wit the motion of flux and reflux by observations alike obvious to the sense or destroy the confirm'd experience of it nay by ocular testimony none ever offer'd to build up a contrary opinion Whilst in the mean time there are not wanting person who for their unskilfullnesse and little experience in Anatomie having nothing agreeable to sense to oppose to it they cavill at it with some vain assertions and such as they adhere to from the authority of Teachers with no solid supposition but with idle and frivolous arguments and bark at it besides with a great many other words and those base ones too with rayling and base scurvy language by which they do no more than shew their own vanity and folly and their basenesse and want of arguments which are to be fetch'd from sense so that they with their false Sophisticall arguments do rage against sense Iust as when the raging winds advancing the waves in the Sicilian Sea dashes them in pieces against the rocks within Charybdis they make a hideous noise and being broken and reverberated hisse and foam so doe these men rage against the reason of their own sense If nothing should be admitted by sense without the testimony of reason or sometimes against the dictate of reason there should be no question now to be controverted If our most certain Authors were not our senses and these things were to be established by reasoning as the Geometricians do in their frames we should truly admit of no Science for it is the rationall demonstration of geometrie from things sensible to demonstrate things to the sense according to which example things abstruse and hid from the sense grow more manifest by things which are easier and better known Aristotle advises us much better lib. 31 de Gen. Anim disputing of the generation of Bees says he you must give credit to your senses if those things which are demonstrated to you are agreeable to those things which are perciptible by sense which as they shall then be better known so you may better trust your sense than your reason Whence we ought to approve or reject all things by examination leisurely made but if you will examine or try whether they be said right or wrong you must bring them to the test of sense and confirm and establish them by the judgement of sense where if there be any thing feignd or not sure it will appear Whence Plato sayes in his Critias That the explication of those things is not hard of which we can come to the experiment nor are those auditors fit for Science that have no experience How hard and difficult a thing is it for those that have no experience to teach such things of which they have no experience or sensible knowledge and how unfit and indocile unexperienced Auditors are to true Science the judgement of blind-men in colours and of deaf men in the distinctió of sounds dos plainly shew Who shall ever teach the flux and reflux of the Sea or by a Geometrical Diagram teach the quantities of Angles or the computation of the sides of a figure to a blind-man or to those that never saw the Sea nor a Diagram A man that is not expert in Anatomie in so far as he cannot conceive the businesse with his own eyes and proper reach in so far is thought to be blind to learning and unfit for he knows not truly any thing concerning which an Anatomist disputes nor any thing from the implanted nature of which he should take his argument but all things he is alike ignorant of as well those things which are gathered and concluded as the things from whence But there is no possible knowledge which arrives not from a pre-existent knowledge and that very demonstrable This one cause is the chief reason why the knowledge we have of the heavenly bodies is so uncertain and conjectural Very fain would I know from those ignorant persons that professe the causes and reasons of all things why as both the eys in beholding move together every way nor particularly one moves this way and the other that way so neither both the ears of the heart Because they know not the causes of fevers or of the plague or the admirable properties of some medicaments and the causes why they are so must therefore these things be denyed Why is the Birth that breaths not till the tenth