History of the discoveries of the circulation of the blood, of the ganglia and nerves, and of the action of the heart / by Robert Lee.

Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: History of the discoveries of the circulation of the blood, of the ganglia and nerves, and of the action of the heart / by Robert Lee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    all the proceedings which took place in the Council and Committee of Physiology of the Eoyal Society in 1845, the effect of which was, for a time, to induce many anatomists and physiologists, wlio had never dissected the parts, to believe that the ganglia and other nervous structures of the uterus, wliich were described and delineated by me in the Pliiloso])hical Transactions, had no existence in nature, but had been fabricated from elastic tissue, cellular membrane, or muscular fibres. The illegal award of the Eoyal Medal in Physiology to a person, who had mutilated tlie structures in two preparations, by the clandestine removal of one of the constituent tissues of the ganglia and nerves, the neurilemma, contributed powerfully to the same effect. The evil consequences of such acts to science, morality, and sound practical principles, were incalculable, but they were only temporary; and out of this darkness and prejudice speedily sprung the Ganglia and Nerves of the Heart, which were destined to encounter the same blind opposition from the same individuals in the Committee of Physiology and Council of the Eoyal Society. The circumstances which led to the discovery of the ganglia and nerves of the heart, lungs, cesophagus, stomach, alimen- tary canal, and liver, have been detailed in the following work. The preliminary observations on the discovery of the circulation of the blood were contained in the Harveian Oration, delivered by me in Latin, before the Eoyal College of Physicians, in 1864, which has not been published. The movements of the heart and blood were discovered by Harvey, as the movements of the planets were discovered by Kepler, but the discovery of the law or doctrine of universal gravitation, by Newton, was required, to render our know- ledge of the system of the world complete. In like manner the discovery of the circulation of the blood remained im- perfect until the cause of the heart's action had been demon- strated.