benefit. The few remaining years of Harvey's life were much embittered by suffering from the gout and other bodily infirmities. He died on the 3rd of June, 1657.

There are many remarks, in the works of this distinguished physiologist, expressive of profound reverence for the great First Cause of all those wonders, into which it was his delight to pry with such curious research. He was accustomed to say, that he never dissected the body of an animal, without discovering something which he had not expected or conceived of, and in which he recognised the hand of an all-wise Creator. To His particular agency, and not merely to the operation of general laws, he ascribed all the phenomena of nature. It would have been gratifying to have traced the effect of the great truths of the Bible, as impressing his heart and regulating his conduct; but on this important question we can say nothing farther, as his biographers are silent.

In his person, Harvey was very small in stature, round faced, of an olive complexion, with small round black eyes, and hair black as a raven till within twenty years of his death, when it became quite white. His mind was furnished with an ample store of general knowledge. In early life, he is said to have been passionate, and apt to draw the dagger—which, after the manner of the times, he constantly wore on very slight occasions. But when he grew up to manhood, and during his long life,

he had the character of being candid, cheerful, and upright, living on terms of harmony with his friends and brethren, and showing no spirit of rivalry and hostility. His visits to his patients he made, we are told, on horseback, with a footcloth, his man following on foot, in the same way in which the judges were then accustomed to ride to Westminster Hall. But in practice, he does not appear to have been particularly successful. The truth was, that the great physiologist not only disdained those arts of gaining the confidence of the public, by which many succeed, but was probably too intent on making discoveries in science, and of too speculative a turn of mind, to devote that attention to practical details, which is so essentially requisite in the art of medicine.

THOMAS SYDENHAM, M.D.

THE mental characteristics of no two individuals differed more widely than those of Harvey and Sydenham, and yet it is doubtful to which of them the science of medicine has been most indebted. The triumphs of the latter were not those of an original and brilliant genius, bent on detecting the hidden operations of creative wisdom; but he possessed a fund of sagacity and practical good sense, which gave him an easy ascendant over the empty theory and vague hypothesis, and, we may add, the

inveterate prejudice likewise, which disgraced the period in which he lived. Unquestionably there exists in the animal body a most wonderful and beneficent provision for the spontaneous removal of injury and disease of every kind. To watch with an unwearied eye the evervarying forms of disease—to detect the latent capabilities of the "restorative power"-to remove all impediments out of the way, and render every available assistance to its operation these are the leading aims of every intelligent and really successful practitioner. Here lay the "great power" of Sydenham. respects it was that his practice was so much in advance of the age in which he lived, and thus, as far as the prejudices of the time would permit, did he accomplish a real and most satisfactory revolution in the entire art of medicine. For accurate descriptions of disease, his works are unrivalled, and in this respect may even now be consulted with advantage.

In these

This justly celebrated physician was born in the year 1624. He was the son of William Sydenham, esq., a gentleman of considerable property in Dorsetshire, whose mansion at Wynford Eagle-now converted into a farmhouse is still in existence, and stands on the property of the present lord Wynford. Of his childhood and early youth nothing is recorded. At the age of eighteen, he was entered a commoner of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, but he could have remained there but a short time, as we are told he left the university when it became

a garrison for king Charles, after the battle of Edge Hill. This occurred in October, 1642. Harvey, as we have already seen, was at Oxford at that time, but probably the young freshman had no intercourse with the great discoverer of the circulation. At all events, they espoused opposite sides on the spiritstirring questions which then agitated the nation. Harvey was a devoted royalist, whilst Sydenham actually joined the parliamentary army, though he could have spent but few years in the camp, and never attained to a higher rank than that of captain. Sir Richard Blackmore asserts, that he entered the profession of medicine by accident, and from necessity, when a disbanded officer, and without any preparatory study or discipline.-" I one day asked Sydenham what books I should read to qualify me for practice. 'Read Don Quixote,' replied he, 'it is a very good book; I read it still.'" Whether this rejoinder were intended as a keen satire upon the medical literature of the age, or, as Dr. Johnson thinks, upon the talents and attainments of Blackmore himself, thus much is certain: Sydenham did return to Oxford, that he might have leisure and opportunity to pursue his medical studies; and, after graduating as bachelor of physic, April 14, 1648, at which time he was likewise elected a fellow of All Souls College, he still remained at Oxford for several years studying his profession, before he entered to any extent into those practical inquiries to which he so

justly attached far greater importance than "to the vain pomp of nice speculations." He took his doctor's degree at Cambridge. On leaving the English universities he visited Montpellier, at that time a celebrated school of physic, and then settled at Westminster, and speedily rose to eminence as a practical physician.

Such was the caution and deliberation with which Sydenham entered upon the duties of his profession, that he is stated to have paid little regard to the time he bestowed in examining individual cases. "Well, I will consider of your case, and in a few days will order something for you." This was the utmost amount of benefit which many patients were able to elicit at a first visit. But he speedily discovered that patients thus received often forgot to come any more, and was, therefore, compelled to adopt a more expeditious and satisfactory mode of procedure. His first considerable work, on "The Method of Curing Fevers," was published in the year 1663, and the inroad which he made on ordinary practice and popular opinion is especially apparent in his then novel method of treating small pox.

The usual mode of dealing with this then fearfully virulent disorder, as with eruptive fevers generally, was as opposite as could well be imagined to the dictates either of nature or of common sense. The unhappy patient was loaded with bed-clothes; lest one refreshing breeze should fan his burning frame, the curtains were drawn closely round; whilst, under