The Anatomy of Melancholy

The Brain it self is divided into two parts, the fore and hinder part; the fore part is much bigger then the other, which is called the little brain in respect of it. This fore part hath many concavities distinguished by certain ventricles, which are the receptacles of the spirits, brought hither by the arteries from the heart, and are there refined to a more heavenly nature, to performe the actions of the soul. Of these ventricles there be three, Right, Left, & Middle. The Right & Left answer to their site, and beget animal spirits; if they be any way hurt, sense and motion ceaseth. These ventricles moreover, are held to be the seat of the common sense.

The Middle ventricle, is a common concourse, & cavity of them both; and hath two passages; the one to receive Pituita, & the other extends it self to the fourth creek: in this they place Imagination and Cogitation, and so the three ventricles of the fore part of the Brain are used. The fourth Creek behind the head, is common to the Cerebel or little brain, and marrow of the back-bone, the last, and most solid of all the rest, which receives the animal spirits from the other ventricles, & conveys them to the marrow in the back, and is the place where they say the memory is seated.