A bibliography of the writings of Dr William Harvey 1578–1657

discrete areas of knowledge were in the sixteenth and seventeenth century closely related and interacting. Whether dealing with the anatomist Harvey, the physician Dalechamps, the astronomer Galileo, or the philosopher Zabarella, Schmitt was always aware of the wider context, and his insights into one speciality often illuminated another. As Charles Webster points out in his introduction, these selected essays also reveal a methodological development within Schmitt's work over two decades. They pass from studies of single problems or single documents, through the signposting of new data or new approaches, to broader syntheses. All were based on an extensive and detailed knowledge of the manuscript sources, mostly unpublished and frequently located in obscure Continental libraries. They also served as models for others, whether investigating the classical tradition in the Renaissance, or reconstructing the networks of intellectual correspondence that linked scholars of Europe and that supplemented the printed book. Above all, they made accessible much of his great learning, which, whether orally or by correspondence, he was always ready to share with anyone interested in intellectual history. This encouragement to others to exploit his own discoveries was typical of his own modesty. Characteristically, the last paper is entitled 'Towards a history of Renaissance philosophy', for he was conscious always of his own limitations and of the great amount that needed to be done before a proper historical perspective could be gained. When he read his beloved Jakob Brucker's massive Historia critica philosophiae (unfortunately misprinted on p. xi), he was conscious both of his debt to his great eighteenth-century predecessor and of the weaknesses of much subsequent scholarship. His early death prevented him from achieving all he set out to do, but these essays show how far he had succeeded in realizing Brucker's implicit claim that to understand the intellectual life of the past it was necessary to be historical, critical, and philosophical.