William Harvey

I profess to learn and to teach anatomy not from books but from dissections, not from the tenets of philosophers but from the fabric of nature.

The heart is the beginning of life; the sun of the microcosm, even as the sun of the world; for from it all motion and all power are derived.

It is absolutely necessary to conclude that the blood in the animal body is impelled in a circle, and is in a state of ceaseless motion; that this is the function which the heart performs by means of its pulse; and that it is the sole and only end of the motion and contraction of the heart.

I have often wondered, and not without reason, why the blood, which is sent by the heart into the lungs, should not pass into the left ventricle, and so into the aorta, without the intervention of the lungs.

I found the task so arduous, and the subject so obscure, that I almost despaired of ever coming to a satisfactory conclusion.

The more carefully I have scrutinized the matter, the more clearly have I seen that the motion of the heart is not to be understood by reason, but by experience.

The heart is the first part which lives, and the last which dies.

Nature is nowhere accustomed to exhibit herself more openly than in her least operations.

All animals, even man himself, are produced from an egg.

The egg is the common origin of all animals.

I have not been ashamed to learn from the meanest of creatures.

Truth is not to be sought in books, but in nature.

The circulation of the blood is a fact, not a theory.

I prefer to discover truth than to teach it.

The heart is the fountain of life, the first to live, the last to die.

Nature is the best physician.

The blood is the life.

The study of anatomy is the foundation of medicine.

To search for truth is to seek the divine.

Experience is the only true teacher.