The heart of animals is the foundation of their life, the sovereign of everything within them, the sun of their microcosm.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Harvey compares the heart to a ruling force that sustains life and governs the body's internal world.
- In plain terms
- The heart is the most important organ that keeps animals alive and controls their bodies.
- What can you take from it?
- Understand the heart as the central driver of biological function.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- How do we define the center of life?
- What governs the self?
Another view
The metaphor may oversimplify complex physiological interactions.
More from William Harvey
All that we know is still infinitely less than all that still remains unknown.
Permalink to quote #2 I profess both to learn and to teach anatomy, not from books but from dissections; not from positions of philosophers but from the fabric of nature.
Permalink to quote #3 I avow myself the partisan of truth alone.
Permalink to quote #4
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