Vesalius, reformer and martyr of science. A historical sketch

Introduction

In the following sketch some of the principal details of the life of the great anatomical investigator, Andreas Vesalius, have been gone into to show what a bitter struggle for existence scientific research in the early stages of its history waged with superstition and fanaticism.

Great comfort is derived from comparing the time when Vesalius lived with the present time, and from a realization of the great changes that have taken place. The flickering light of investigation, then weak and unsteady, is transformed into a powerful force for the general enlightenment. And while Vesalius, a pioneer of scientific research, was compelled to conduct his investigations underground, now science and its discoveries are taught in magnificent temples of learning. But there still is a struggle between the disciples of enlightenment and its enemies, with the roles reversed ; now study is pursued in the full light of day, while the apostles of superstition and fanaticism are working more or less underground and in the dark.

Vesalius, the investigator and martyr, is one of the heroes who suffered persecution and untold hardships for what we now possess, and he calls forth our highest admiration and our most grateful

respect.

If this biographical sketch of Vesalius, the reformer and martyr of science, awakens a desire and effort for the further enlightenment of the human mind and strengthens all those who are aiming at intellectual freedom the author will feel amply repaid for his work.

The Author.

Cincinnati, Ohio.

Junel, 1907.

i

VESALIUS.

ACT T.

SCENE I. The Tribunal of the Inquisition

Inquisitor. (Dark red dahlia as button-hole. He turns toward the torturers.) Bring the defendants in ! {Defendants in shackles are brought in.)

Inquisitor. { Turning to one of the defendants.) You are an apostate of our holy church, a follower of the new gospel ; you are a heretic and you have confessed your guilt.

First Defendant. Well, I have pleaded guilty under the tortures of the rack, to end my suffering. I am not guilty of anything.

Inquisitor. {Severely.) And now you deny your guilt?

Defend. Upon my solemn oath, T am innocent; the Duchess Margareth, the Governor of the Netherlands, has granted us protestants, in a special treatise, permission to think otherwise ps regards the holy communion than the church in power. I am a predicant, and insist upon my right granted by special treatise.

Inquis. You kuow, or at all events you should know, that the Duchess Margareth afterwards, at repeated times, publicly declared that she does not consider herself bound by the treatise ; as the united heretics, to wit, the Anabaptists, Calvinists and Lutherans, took advantage of the embarassment of the Governor of the Netherlands and forced the treatise in question upon the Duchess Margareth. You have been permitted to think otherwise of the holy communion, but to perform it in another than the usual manner means crime. In addition, you ought to know that the way you baptize and marry, and your manner of burial, are forbidden by the law, on the penalty of death. You know that a trifling change in the ceremonies at church, which the backsliders are found guilty of, is considered to be a felony, and that a number of predicants, who administered their duties at a place other than the one they had been ordered to occupy, have been proceeded against and hanged. Do you plead guilty now?

Defend. I do not. I insist upon my privilege according to treatise.

Inguis. (Turning toward rackers.) Lay hold of him and take him down once more on the stretch !

Defend. Mercy ! I have a wife and children.

Inquis. That is another felony; you say you are married, a man who pretends to preach the gospel!

Defend. Do you try a second time to compel me under the tortures of the rack to accuse myself of a crime which I never committed? You know as well as I that you will never succeed in torturing the truth out of the scorched flesh and the quivering nerves by the aid of a pair of red-hot tongs, or by use of the thumbscrews.

Inquis. (Turning to lorlurers.) Seize him and take him down once more into the chamber of horror ; put him on the rack.

The lorlurers seize him, and lake him downstairs, underground.

Inquis. (Addressing the other defendant.) You are accused of robbery, and have been found guilty according to the evidence given by eye-witnesses. Do you plead guilty?

Second Defendant. I do.

Inquis. You have always been a faithful and devoted Christian, have you not?

Defend. I have always been a devout churchgoer, and can present all the tickets of my regular confessions ; there is not one missing. The devil came along quite suddenly and led me into temptation. He was so quick that I did not even find time to becross myself and say a prayer.

Inquis. Do you repent your crime?

Defend. [Becrossing himself '.] Indeed I do, with all my heart, as true as God is in being!

Inquis. You have been sentenced to be broken on the wheel up to the neck, but we will change this sentence on the condition that you bring to justice, dead or alive, one or the other of the miscreants who steal the corpses from fhe wheel and the gallows, and even from the grave.

d heartrending cry is heard from the basement.

Inquis. [Pointing toward basement.] That apostate and backslider of our holy church will now soon change his mind, down in the chamber of torture !

The dead man as well as the live one belongs to the church, and he who steals a corpse from the gallows robs the church, and consequently the Lord, thus committing a mortal sin that can only be requited by capital punishment. The question is to find the hiding places where those miscreants take the bodies as the idols of science ; in fact, for their black and devilish artifices. For that purpose you must suffer being stolen from the wheel. Those wicked men, in their contempt of God and the Holy Church, are associated with the devil, and we give you full authority to capture them dead or alive; or, at all events, to ferret out their hiding places, and accomplishing this you will be dismissed without punishment.

(Defendant is led away.

Tnquis. Now, dear members of this Tribunal of the Holy Inquisition, you fellow combatants in the battle for the cause of God and the Holy Church, let us send up a quiet prayer for the aid of the Almighty. Wheresoever a foe of the Holy Church is disclosed, he is to be annihilated. At the present time of wickedness Satan is amongst us, represented by the Anabaptists, the Calvinists and the Lutherans. Luther, the apostate, is the principal instrument of the devil, and what they call science is the greatest of hellish artifices, for its aim is to rob the faithful of their belief in God and estrange them from the Church. It is science that kills untold numbers of souls and delivery them to the arch-fiend of God — to the devil — and to the tortures of eternal perdition. It is the solemn duty of every believer in the Holy Church to save those poor and misled souls from everlasting perdition. Therefore, let us use all our public power, and all our most secret influence, to fight Satan, the prince of darkness, by crushing science, one of his principal tools. Investigation is sin, because it aims at lifting the veil from things God in his infinite wisdom has resolved shall remain secreted forever. He has revealed what is to our benefit ; it is belief and not science that comforts and benefits mankind. For the sake of belief, God in heaven has sacrificed his only son, but not for the sake of a science that undermines belief in God. All of you know that among us, in this very city, we have agents of Satan, who ransack gallows and graves, using the bodies for their wicked purposes, and all for the sake of undermining the foundation of the Holy Church. Science and scientific research are inventions of the devil, and are his most efficient instruments. Call to mind Mondini, dissecting human bodies, and Huss and Savanarola, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Ulrich de Huiien, and others, and tell me what they deserve. [The Tribunal gives the unanimous answer : "They deserve death."] Now swear that you will do all in your power to annihilate the agents and instruments of Satan. Let us touch the wounds of our Saviour and swear: Fial jus'tilia, pereal mundi! Let justice be done though the whole world perishes. [The board answers unanimously: "We swear."]

Inquis. Now let us pray for the aid of the Almighty, in order that he may assist in our glorious Christian work.

sill pray silently.

Well, now we are prepared for our work, and all for the glory of God !

[ Turning lo lorlurers.~\ Bring in the defendant. They bring him in, assisting him lo keep upon

his feel.

Inquis. Now you have changed your mind, have you not? Do you plead guilty?

(Defend. I am not guilty. I am a predicant of the New Creed, and I insist upon my right according to the treatise, to be allowed to preach the new gospel.

Inquis. You are a predicant of the new creed, to wit, of heresy, and that is a capital sin ; and the fact that you do not plead guilty to your heresy and renounce it is another capital sin, and that you do not repent is an additional sin. Moreover, you once preached at a place other than the one at which you had permission, and that means an additional felony ; you ought to be glad that you are in position to lose but one life though deserving manifold death. [Turning to the Tribunal.] What is your sentence, gentlemen? Is the defeadant guilty?

The Tribunal answers unanimously: "The defendant is guilty, deserving of death."

Inquis. We find you guilty and sentence you to death. Prepare yourself for your last hour ; tomorrow you go to the gallows ! God be merciful to your poor soul. {Turning lo lorlurers.) Take him away!

lis Ihey la Ice hold of Mm and lead him away, he lurns about and shouts:

You are no judges; you are agents of that Devil about whom you prate !

SCENE II. Anne and Ballhasar

Ballhasar. Well, Anne?

Anne* Well, Balthasar.

Ballh. You are going to be my wife? Now I am the happiest creature on earth.

Anne. Who said that I am going to be your wife?

Ballh. Anne, you said "Well, Balthasar," when I asked "Well, Anne?"

Anne. I did not understand the meaning of your "Well. Anne?"

BallTi. I keep on thinking of you all the time ; have not you any idea of all my suffering?

Anne. I see that you squirm and keep holding your hands to the stomach. Do you suffer from stomach-ache?

(Ba'llh. I feel so unhappy. Say, what shall I do?

Anne. Take some hot tea.

tBallh. How's that ! You mean to cure my lovesick heart with hot tea? How my heart does nutter !

Anne. Small wooder, your heart is too timid! Why don't you get a lion's heart?

BaWi. But where can I get one?

Anne. Get courage.

Ballh. Where from? I have courage enough to marry you.

Anne- I shall get married to a man who has the heart of a lion.

Ballh. I feel now almost like a lion !

Anne. Why do you not assist my brother, who tonight will have a duty to perform that requires the courage of the lion.

Ballh. Most certainly I will do it. I promise. And then I may hope?

Anne. Only then. Tonight, in assisting my brother, you will have an opportunity to prove that you have a stout heart.

Ballh. (To himself.) What will that be? {Aloud.) Whatever it may be I'll go through the fire for your sake, my dear Anne.

Anne. I am not yet your Anne. "You will go through the fire for my sake ! " Why not through the dark night, too?

Ballh. Of course ! ( Timidly.) With or without a lantern? Through the fire one can make his way without a ] an tern, but not through the dark.

Anne. Would you dare to look death in the face?

Ballh. Not by night, because then I cannot see; armed with a lantern I will look in both his eyes.

Anne. You will have to face death.

Ballh. My own death, or the death of somebody else?

Anne. Your own.

Ballh. Well, to meet death does not require a lantern ; one can die as well in the dark as by daylight. But what in the world is to become of my marriage?

Anne. Marriages are made in heaven.

Ballh. Anne, I have struck an idea! Give me a kiss; that will give me the courage of a lion.

Anne. Not now. A kiss shall be the reward of your having accomplished something. Show your courage and go at midnight —

Ballh. (Interrupting her.) "At midnight! " I can show my courage by daylight as well; it is worth being looked at by daylight ; it need not be hidden.

Anne- At midnight.

Batik. With or without moonshine?

Anne. At midnight, without moonlight, you will have to go to the graveyard, and —

Balih. {With fear, to himself: Anne is preparing a nice mess for me. "To go to the graveyard! " Is that not sufficient? What, then, is that "and" for?)

Anne. And to handle a corpse.

Balih. With or without mitts?

Anne. With your bare hands. You know that my brother, Ansel m, is my guardian, and he has made this a point in his consent to my marriage. He says that you have a wonderful heart of —

Balih. (Interrupting her.) Heart of a lion. You see your brother knows my heart better than you.

Anne. Why don't you let me finish? He says you have a wonderful heart of a hare.

Balih. I have the heart of a hare ! Goodbye, Anne ! Now I will go straight to your brother, and find out what cruel game he is going to play upon me. [He goes.]

Anne. How I would like to save dear, timid Balthasar that hard ordeal ! But brother Anselm cannot perform his difficult and dismal task alone. He needs a faithful and discreet helpmate. Brother Anselm is always willing and ready to put his life at stake if his fearless and high-minded friend, Master Vesalius, is to be rendered a service. I will now go and tell my brother that tonight he will have an honest and devoted helper.

SCENE III. Graveyard by night zlnselm and Ballhasar

Ans. Here we are at our place of destination.

Ballh. I am more dead than alive.

Sins. Already ! Indeed ! Well, a burying ground is more fit for the dead than the alive. All those people down there, under ground, are also more dead than alive, and if you do not look out, you will tomorrow be dangling at the gallows — still more dead than alive. It is always preferable to die this way, [making a pass with his forefinger in a horizontal direction,] that is in bed, than to die this way, [making a move in a vertical direction,] that is at the gallows.

Ballh. I am afraid of being here at midnight !

pins. I am afraid, too. I am afraid of your being afraid.

Ballh. There, the chimes of the chapel tower strike midnight. What a dismal hour !

Ans. What is there dismal about midnight! The clock strikes twelve, precisely as at noon.

Ballh. And what a death-like stillness !

$Lns. The dead, as a rule, are very still. All those people there, underground, who when alive had so much to say are now dumb and still.

Ballh. The night is raven-black!

Sins. Indeed, as raven-black as the ravens that croak yonder at the gallows ! [The croaking of ravens is heard.]

Ballh. I don't hear them. It is even too dark to hear! The darkness around prevents my seeing how dark it is. Sight and hearing leave me.

Ans. The ravens are greeting us because they scent in us two gallow birds ; or, maybe, they are angry because we come to snatch two dainty morsels from them!

Ballh. Night is nobody's friend!

tins. On the contrary, it is our best friend; night is friendly to thieves.

Ballh. Oh ! we are thieves !

Vlns. Not yet ; but we have the best intention. But no; we do not steal, the thief steals, taking what belongs to other people and using it for his own benefit. Where there is no property there can be no thieves. Those fellows dangling from the gallows are nobody's property, and we are about to take them down, not to enrich ourselves, but for the purpose of scientific investigation.

'Ballh. For what we are about to perpetrate there is no dispense.

Sins. Who says so? I'll give you any amount — as much as you want of it.

Ballh. You are a wicked man ; you are infected by the Luther plague. (He becrosses himself.) It is late, one o'clock draws near.

$Ln$. One o'clock! That is early. It cannot well strike less than one o'clock. Now, Balthasar, we must look out, otherwise we may fare badly. Don't forget that I have a sister whose name is Anne. She will never yield her heart to a hare-hearted man.

Ballh. Oh, my dear Anne! Anselm! Now I feel almost like a lion.

Ans. JLlmosl like a lion ! (The cry of a screech owl is heard.)

Ballh. {Timidly.) Ha,rk! (To himself .) What a dismal sound!

pins. What are you mumbling?

c Ballh. How loveJy it sounds! About as sweet as the croaking of the raven beneath the gallows. It is not a good foreboding.

pins. Indeed, look out, or it may prove for you a dismal foreboding, if tomorrow you swing at the gallows. By that call of a screech owl a friend gives me warning that the way is not yet clear. The grave-wardens are on their midnight beat, and they are drawing nearer.

Ballh. Oh, oh, now I am lost!

pins. ( Under his breath.) If you don't show that you possess the heart of a lion, I will call the wardens ; then goodbye, Anne.

Ballh. I will do everything you tell me.

Pins. I am just going to bury you.

Ballh. Why you are not going to bury me alive, are you?

pins. Fear has made you more dead than alive.

Ballh. Then I shall be buried without having confessed !

pins. You can attend to your confession underground ; but before you can do that we must perpetrate something to have something to confess. I promise you an early resurrection. (Anselm lifts one end of a tombstone slab ) Now make haste and get down, I shall follow you immediately !

Ballh. For heaven's sake ! Down there I shall go-! It looks like the gates of hell !

Pins. There, I see the torches of the patro] ! Get in and down or tomorrow you will swing at the gallows. {Ballhasar slides down the opening and disappears, vlnselm follows; then tombstone, that serves as a lid of the grave, closes like a trap door. Grave wardens with torches turn up in the background, and draw near.)

One of the Grave Wardens, I am sure I have heard voices in this direction.

The Corporal. I think you are mistaken.

Warden. By all the saints, I am not mistaken !

Corporal. Does it not seem to you as if that tombstone were waving in the air like a long, white veil?

{till horrified.) Sure! It is a ghost! (;# voice from under the ground: "Do give me peace!" General excitement among the grave wardens.)

One of the Wardens. This voice came out of the grave. (M the grave wardens becross themselves.)

Corporal. Well, we are not here to hunt for the dead, but for the living. Draw closer and let us offer a quiet prayer for the poor soul that cannot find rest. There are, indeed, signs and miracles in these godless and unfaithful times, when Luther and others have rebelled against the Holy Church, their mother. {Grave wardens in quiet prayer. They then withdraw, flfier a while the tomb slab rises again, but slowly, and the head of flnselm is visible, cautiously looking round. Finally vlnselm emerges from under the lifted slab.)

tins. Well, Balthasar, you hare-hearted creature, get out if you are still alive. Oh, my poor sister !

( Balih. {While climbing out of the grave.) Oh, Anne, now I am a man ! ( Under his breath and timidly.) Are they gone? It was fearful down there. Oh, Anne, I can achieve everything for your sake!

Pins. Well, come along to the gallows, and if you don't do what I order you to do you will have to go tomorrow upon the gallows, and that will break your neck, and the neck of your marriage, too. Now go and take the corpse from the gallows, while I take the other one that is fastened to the rack. See if the corpse is quite stiff and cold, as sometimes they are still about half alive. Do not forget to leave a piece of the rope attached to the corpse when you cut him down. Having done this we will put each body into a sack, lift it over the low graveyard wall, and then drag both bundles to this spot and dump them down into the grave vault.

Ballh. I hear something like the croaking of ravens. That is ominous!

pins. Oh ! I see now you have suddenly recovered your hearing, but I tell you stop immediately your croaking or it may come to pass that tomorrow the ravens will pick your eyes from their sockets. ( The croaking of ravens is heard-.) Indeed, here they are ! They are glad to make your acquaintance. Well, now, let us set to work. {'Both climb over the low wall of the church yard. Then a thud is heard, and, after a brief interval, another dull sound. They climb back over the wall of the graveyard and drag the bundles forward.)

Sins. Now we have got them ; one life and a half we have put at the stake and we have got two stiffs.

Ballh. How do you mean?

pins. I have put one life, my life, at the stake, and you, Balthasar, only half a life, because you are half way dead. (JLnselm lifts one end of the slab, securing il by an iron rod, then ITiey dump the bundles into the opening and follow them, ttnselm is late lo follow, and al the moment he reaches out his arms lo adjust the slab the cry of a load is heard.)

jlns> That cry of a toad means that the catchers are near, but they won't catch anything. (He allows the slab lo gently slide down into Us framing. Grave wardens appear in the background and draw near.)

The Corporal. We must do everything in our power to catch those rascals; the gallows as well as the rack have been plundered and both corpses have disappeared. A trace leads from the gallows to and over the wall of the graveyard to this spot. It is not ghosts that robbed the gallows, but crooked men. (Turning to one of the grave wardens.) Show me a light! Look here, the dew has been wiped from the grass, and these grounds, consecrated with holy water, have been desecrated. I put my head at stake ; I will hunt down the miscreants. They shall not escape the capital punishment meted out for this offence. They cannot have secreted their heavy burdens as yet, and are most certainly still within the limits of the graveyard. (Turning to the grave wardens.) Go and make a thorough search.

[Grave wardens disband, going different directions to make a thorough investigation. The cry of a screech owl is heard from beneath the ground, the leader of the patrol answers by the same cry, and stooping down taps three times on the slab saying: "Now you are safe, hail to science!"]

Scene IV

Van Sylvius and his daughter, Sylvia, Ihe former having a dark dahlia as a bullon-hole.

Sylvius. I sent for you to learn if I may still call you my daughter.

Sylvia. Dear father !

Sylv. Up till now you have been my pride and my delight.

Sylvia. And now, father, I am not longer your pride and your delight?

Sylv. You have done the utmost to estrange your father. If your heart allows you to sacrifice your father and your faith, your honor ought to forbid you to drag the glorious traditions of our family into the mire.

Sylvia. What harsh and strange words! I do not know what to think of you, dear father. I do not understand what you mean.

Sylv. And I do not understand what you do. I, myself, do not know what to think of you. What has come over you? Are you still a devoted believer? Are you still a faithful confessor of our holy church? Or have the heretics lured you into their satanic snares and made you forget your father and all the time-honored and glorious traditions of our patrician family? We have cherished and guarded that family treasure like our eyeballs. Up to this very day I have been hoping and trusting you might again find yourself. But alas ! You are more than ever under the influence of a heretic. Your new creed — is — Vesalius —

Sylvia. 0, my dear father, do not utter such cruel and merciless words! It is not only a desire of my heart, but the duty of my conscience, to raise my voice against any misrepresentation of a man whose genius and irreproachable character deserve the highest praise.

Sylv. Well, all you say only confirms my belief that the necromancer, Vesalius, who practices his hellish, black artifice undergound, has entirely ensnared you in his satanic meshes. I now realize that the time has passed for acting as your father, and therefore I will take measures as your guardian. In any event, I do not want to be the father of a daughter who sacrifices the eternal welfare of her soul in order to exchange it for the friendship of a heretic. Solemnly and upon my oath I declare right here, that at this very instant I cease to be your father, and the first thing I intend to do as your guardian is to endeavor to save your poor soul from eternal perdition by having you transferred to a convent.

Sylvia. For heaven's sake, don't do that, my father I I prefer to die rather than be buried alive in a convent.

Sylv. Indeed, it is for heaven's sake that I am going to have you taken to a convent, because it is high time for you to look out for your salvation and offer up daily and even hourly prayers in order to save your soul from eternal perdition.

Sylvia. Do you really think you are able to force me back into the dungeon of your belief? Never, never! Not blind belief, but truth and science is now my heaven. It is enlightenment that my soul is longing for, after having been kept languishing in the dark of mental incarceration.

Sylv. More enlightenment! Well, you and your wicked company shall have it, for it may be that by tomorrow the flames of the stake will blaze fiercely, at which Vesalius, the hero of your faith, will be transfigured and glorified.

Sylvia. Please cease using such horrible language, such cruel words of the wildest fanaticism, convincing me that — I — no — longer — have — a — father !

No father can lacerate the heart of his daughter in such cruel manner. (Pressing her hands to her heart.) Keep up your courage, thou poor, tortured, quivering heart! Thou art full to bursting with agony, but thou hast the sublime mission to beat for him in whom all my life and all my happiness is rooted. Every time thou beatest, thou beatest for him, the hero and herald of the gospel of freedom of conscience and thought ! He who believes that truth can be cremated at the blazing stake, and thus become wiped from the face of the earth, need not be surprised if he encounter sad disappointment. For, out of the ashes of the martyr of the new gospel rises with unfettered wings the Phoenix of truth, soaring to more luminous spheres, up toward the sun, encompassing triumphantly the universe. It is you, my father, who is in error, and who commits a sin against the holy ghost of humanity ; but, verily, I say unto you, that neither the fulmination of the pope, nor the Duke de Alva, with his Spanish Inquisition and his blazing stakes, will succeed in extinguishing the eternal light of truth, because that light is inextinguishable. And I, for myself, with might and main, and as long as a single fiber of my heart quivers and as long as a free thought flashes through my brain, I will set myself against being buried alive in a convent. I do not fear death, but I will not sutler being entombed alive. I am sorry, my father v that you are right — Veealius and many other pioneers of the freedom of thought and scientific research are compelled to make their anatomical researches underground, amidst owls and bats, and other creatures of the same feather, shunning the light. It is true the flickering light of free thought and free investigation is still weak and unsteady, but, though small, it is inextinguishable. It is the eternal beacon light of science that shines and enlightens, while your so-called eternal lamp yields but sufficient light to more shockiDgly show the awful darkness of the surroundings inimical to truthful investigation. And interested hands are busy in keeping the human mind enshrouded in that everlasting darkness humanity is groping in. At present the faint but holy light of the new gospel comforts but the investigators of scientific truth, who are compelled to maintain a miserable existence underground— in cellars and sepulchres. But the time will come when the light of science, faint as it is at present, will turn into a heavenly light, as powerful as the sun himself, to enlighten the minds of all human beings that have been darkened under the influence of your bigoted belief. It is my belief and my gospel that the time will come when this light of newly revealed truths, faint and flickering as it now is, will become an almighty sun of enlightenment. I know that the time will come when scientific investigation will no longer be compelled to work and study in dark recesses, but will be protec ted and taught in magnificent temples.