To him, as to Vesalius before him, the current views of the
movements of the blood were unsatisfactory, more particularly the
movements of the heart and arteries, which were regarded as an active
expansion by which they were filled with blood, like bellows with air.
The question of the transmission of blood through the thick septum
and the transference of air and blood from the lungs to the heart were
secrets which he was desirous of searching out by means of experiment.
(27) Harvey: Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis
in Animalibus, Francofurti, 1628.
One or two special points in the work may be referred to as illustrating
his method. He undertook first the movements of the heart, a task so
truly arduous and so full of difficulties that he was almost tempted to
think with Fracastorius that "the movement of the heart was only to be
comprehended by God." But after many difficulties he made the following
statements: first, that the heart is erected and raises itself up into
an apex, and at this time strikes against the breast and the pulse is
felt externally; secondly, that it is contracted every-way, but more
so at the sides; and thirdly, that grasped in the hand it was felt
to become harder at the time of its motion; from all of which actions
Harvey drew the very natural conclusion that the activity of the heart
consisted in a contraction of its fibres by which it expelled the blood
from the ventricles.
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