Croonian Lecture .—Upon the motion of the mammalian heart

Abstract

In these days when Europe is ablaze from end to end and our armies are fighting to regain that freedom and peace which a few years back enabled us undisturbed to pursue our search for knowledge, I wish that this lecture could deal with some problem which affects the health of our troops. But though engaged for some while with my fellow workers upon problems of this kind, I am unable to deliver the lecture in this form. Were I to attempt it with the material at my disposal, it would not be compatible with the traditions of this lectureship to which you have done me the honour of appointing me. As an alternative permit me to review a chapter of physiology recently brought to completion and one which we may fairly claim to have been compiled in chief part by workers in this country. Three hundred years have passed since William Harvey, our fellow countryman, preached the doctrine by which his name has been immortalised. In his book ‘ De Motu Cordis,’ that famous model of unclouded thought and of scientific reasoning, he wrote of the mammalian heart in these words :—