§ 143. Servetus as a Phi/sician, Scientist, and Astrologer.
Being supplied with the necessary funds, Servetus returned to Paris in 1536 and took his degrees as magister and doctor of medicine. He acquired great fame as a ph3\sician.
1 " Sunt eniin Germani in Dei cultum propensi, semel tomen Imhutas opiniones non facile deserunt, nee in schismate queiint ad concordiam leduci, sed hwresim quisque suam valide tuetur."
2 " Suabia, ingenio singulari prw.dita, prmstantissima Germanice a Plutarcho dicta."
724 THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
The medical world was then divided into two schools, - — the Galenists, who followed Hippocrates and Galen, and the Averrhoists, who followed Averrhoes and Avicenna. Servetus was a pupil of Champier, and joined the Greek school, but had an open eye to the truth of the Arabians.
He published in 1537 a learned treatise on Syrups and their use in medicine. . It is his most popular book, and passed through four editions in ten years .^
He discovered the pulmonary circulation of the blood or the passage of the blood from the right to the left chamber of the heart through the lungs by the pulmonary artery and vein. He published it, not separately, but in his work on the Restitution of Christianity, as a part of his theological speculation on the vital spirits. The discovery was burnt and buried with this book ; but nearly a hundred years later William Harvey (1578-1658), independently, made the same discovery .^
Servetus lectured in the University on geography and astrology, and gained much applause, but excited also the envy and ill-will of his colleagues, whom he treated with overbearing pride and contempt.
He wrote an " Apologetic Dissertation on Astrology," ^ and severely attacked the physicians as ignoramuses, who in return denounced him as an impostor and wind-bag. The
^ Syroporum universa Ratio ad Galeni censnram diligenter exposita, etc. Parisiis ex officina Simonis Colinaji, 1537 ; Venetiis, 1545 and 1548, and Lugduni, 1546 and 1547. Comp. Willis, ch. XI. Ill sq. ; v. d. Linde, pp. 53 sqq. (with the full title on p. 54).
2 Restit. Christ., bk. V. p. 170. See G. Sigmond, The unnoticed Theories of Servetus, London, 1826; Flourens, Histoire de la d^couverte de la circulation du sanr/, Paris, 1854; sec. ed. 1857; ToUin, Die Entdeckung des Blutkreislaufs durch Michael Servet, Jena, 1876 (comp. his Kritische Bemerkungen iiber Harvey und seine Vorganger, 1882) ; Willis (who is a doctor of medicine), pp. 210 sqq. ; and v. d. Linde, pp. 123 sqq. Harvey probably never saw the Restitutio, and is therefore as much entitled to the merit of an original discovery as Columbus, who was ignorant of the expeditions of the Norsemen to North America.
3 Reprinted in Berlin, 1880.
§ 144. SERVETUS AT VIENNE. 725
senate of the University sided with the physicians, and the Parliament of Paris forbade him to lecture on astrology and to prophesy from the stars (1538).i
He left Paris for Charlieu, a small town near Lyons, and practised medicine for two or three years.
At his thirtieth year he thought that, after the example of Christ, he should be rebaptized, since his former baptism was of no value. He denied the analogy of circumcision. The Jews, he says, circumcised infants, but baptized only adults. This was the practice of John the Baptist;, and Christ, who had been circumcised on the eighth day, was baptized when he entered the public ministry. The promise is given to believers only, and infants have no faith. Baptism is the beginning of regeneration, and the entrance into the kingdom of heaven. He wrote two letters to Calvin on the subject, and exhorted him to follow his example.^
His arrogance made him so unpopular that he had to leave Charlieu.-^
§ 144. Servetus at Vienne. His Annotations to the Bible.
Villeneuve now repaired to Vienne in Dauphin^ and settled down as a physician under the patronage of Pierre Palmier, one of his former hearers in Paris, and a patron of learning, who had been appointed archbishop of that see. He was provided with lodgings in the archiepiscopal palace, and made a comfortable living by his medical practice. He spent thirteen years at Vienne, from 1540 to 1553, which were probably the happiest of his fitful life. He conformed to the Catholic religion, and was on good terms with the higher
1 V. d. Linde, pp. 65 sqq. In this respect Servetus was behind Calvin, who boldly attacked the superstition of astrology (see above, § 135, pp. 076 sqq.); but, strange to say, even in our days the " Vox Stellarum" is regularly printed in England and finds thousands of readers. Willis, p. 125.
2 Ep. XV. and XVI. ad Calv., in Christianismi Restitutio, pp. 613-619.
3 Bolsec (p. 18 sq.) reports that Servetus was " constrainct de se partir de Charlieu pour les folies lesquelles il faisoil."