History of Psychology:

(a)Psychology in sixteenth century:

The period from about 1450 to 1550 is generally known as the Renaissance Period. Its origin can be traced back to the thirteenth century. Some scholars would have extended the word Renaissance to include the late sixteenth century.
Many works of Aristotle that had not been well known in the middle ages were now made available in Latin and some even in other languages, such as French, German, English and Italian.
Plato was now made more accessible. As a result of all this activity, Platonic and scholastic thought can be seen to influence the philosophers and thinking of the Renaissance period.
Vesalius (1514-1564) started as a believer in Galen's anatomy but after dissecting both animals and humans for himself, came to disconfirm many of Galen's beliefs. Vesalius argued that the brain and the nervous system, as opposed to the heart, were the seats of psychological activity.
During the sixteenth century several hundred books concerned with psychology were printed. Aristotle's De Anima was reprinted by many different authors and often with a new commentary; commentaries were also written on other classical works, such as , Theophrastus's book on senses, and Galen's book on temperaments.
Juan Luis (1492-1540) published his book De anima which deals with the nature of the soul and with the senses. It is also discussed Galen's humoral theory. Vives also described memory, understanding and will. Augustine argued that memory depends on the way the learner organize the material and that forgetting can occur either because the information is erased or because it is temporarily. Vives also noted the importance of  association. How a trivial sensation or idea can evoke an important idea associated with it. Vives also discussed with emotions.
Indagine published an introduction to physiognomy, (science of physical appearance of face), chiromancy (palmistry) and astrology (belief that the stars have an influence on human personality or behavior) in 1522 and Rio (1551-1608) added dream interpretation to this list. Galen and Nemesius in 1575 wrote, The examination of Men's Wits. This work was rapidly translated into several European languages.
Haurte focused on the question of intelligence. He attempted to show what bodily signs and behavior patterns correlate with different types of intellectual ability and to suggest ways in which the intellect may be cultivated. Haurte, having discussed the relations between the qualities and the intellect in some detail, then asserted that different kinds of intellectual activity require imagination, understanding (reason) and memory in different proportions.
Another topic which gained some popularity in sixteenth century psychology was that of Mnemonics or memory training. The author of Ad Herennium advocated the method of loci for memorization.
Many of other topics of psychological interest, such as sleeping and dreaming, the special senses were also discussed. The humors and the temperaments were common topics. There were a number of books on the "passions".
The word 'psychology' was used in a book title in a manuscript by Marulice (1450-1524). A rough guess at the date of its appearance would be 1520.

(b)Psychology in seventeenth Century:

This is the century in which modern concepts of physics and astronomy displaced the old concepts of Aristotle and Ptolemy.
Harvey (1578-1657) is best known for his argument that the blood circulates around the body. To him, the heart's functions is not to produce any special kind of spirits, nor is the liver there no manufacture the blood. Instead the heart is a large pump, sending blood into the arteries, then into the veins, then into the veins, then into the lungs, then back into the arteries. In his book, Circulation of Blood, he asserted: "Medical schools admit three kinds of spirits: the natural spirits, flowing through the veins, the vital spirits through the arteries, and the animal spirits through the nerves.... but we have found none of these spirits by dissection , neither in the veins, nerves, arteries nor other parts of living animals.
Descartes (1596-1650) is famous for his best known claim, "I think, therefore I am". He devoted himself to mathematical and philosophical meditation. Descartes accepted Harvey's theory of the circulation of the blood but added to it a theory of animal spirits. He claimed that the heart was filled with a kind of innate heat. In his book, On Man, Descartes went on to describe how the Pineal gland is moved and shaken by incoming animal spirits. He added, the animal spirits are carried down the nerves to muscles; as the spirits run into the muscles, they  are inflated, thus causing contraction of the body region. According to Descartes, messages are sent via the animal spirits in the nerves to the brain, where the pineal gland shunts them into those pores leading most directly to the nerves controlling the movements of the organ.
In 1677, Leeuwenhock had suggested that a nerve was made up of very small vessels, "lying by one another" but still wondered whether animal spirits ran through the vessels.
Borelli (1608-1679) however, suggested that nerves were more solid and consisted of a moist, spongy substance.
Thomas Willis (1621-1675) described the blood vessels of the brain in detail. He tried to describe various functions to the various brain parts. He thought the cerebellum was necessary to life functions.
Willis must be given credit as the foremost exponent of the view that the brain determines behavior and for taking a new look at an old problem. He also wrote well on certain nervous diseases.

(c)Psychology in Eighteenth Century:

Knowledge of the anatomy of the brain was advanced considerably in the eighteenth century. In many ways the information on anatomy was quite modern; what was lacking was an understanding both of the modus operandi of the nerves and of the functions of the various parts of the brain.
Throughout the eighteenth century there were attempts to offer grand syntheses of neurology, psychology and theology.
G.E Stahl (1660-1743) argued against Stahl's "soul" in favour of the notion that certain tissues in the body had particular properties that made them appear ensouled but that in fact could be describes mechanistically.
Unzer was largely responsible for the introduction of the word stimulus and response to refer to the sensory and motor elements.
In 1784 Prochask introduced the term Sensorium Commune to refer to the presumed locus of interaction between the influence of the stimulus and initiation of the response.
John Dalton (1766-1844) mentioned that some persons-Dalton himself included-could not distinguish among certain colors. Dalton himself had difficulty distinguishing red and green. It came to be known as "color blindness".
Haller suggested that the sensations of different pitches may have something to do with the length of the fibers of the cochlea, a theory that adumbrated Helmholtz's later resonance theory.
At the end of the century, Erasmus Darwin (1794-1896) described how a certain patient had anesthesia in his legs for touch and pinpricks, yet he could detect heat if a hot object was brought near one of his legs.
David Hartley (1705-1757) and Charles Bonnet (1720-1790) argued that an understanding of animal and human behavior rested ultimately on an understanding of nervous system.
David Hume (1711-1776) distinguished mental ideas from sensory impressions.

(d) Psychology in Nineteenth Century:

Reid's best known disciple Dugald Stewart (1753-1823) was critical of Tabula Rasa theory and upheld an emphasis on instinctive behavior. Thomas Brown (1778-1820) became fascinated with philosophical psychology. He gave greater precision to the classification of associations on sensation in the muscles.
Jermy Bentham (1748-1832) is best known for his development of the theory that our basic motivations are to avoid pain and pursue pleasure.
Alexandar Bain (1818-1903) composed two books on the subject of psychology, The senses and the intellect (1855) and The emotions and The Will (1859). These were the first generally adopted text books of psychology in the English language. They dealt with the nervous system and mental phenomena.
Charles Bell (1744-1842) and Francois Magendie (1783-1855) discovered that the posterior roots of spinal cord contain sensory fibers only, whereas the anterior roots contain motor fibers.
Johannas Mullar (1801-1858) articulated the so-called Doctrine of specific Energies. He described the specific qualities of neutral transmission. According to him our awareness is not objects, but rather  of our nerves themselves.
Pierre Flourens (1794-1867) in his procedure an area of the brain of a living animal is isolated, then removed surgically or destroyed without damaging the remainder of the brain. After recuperation, the animal is observed for loss of function and recovery of function. He assumed that six separate areas exist in the brain and, using this surgical skills, we able to identify the important functions of each area:

• Cerebral hemisphere: Willing, judging, memory, seeing and hearing.
• Cerebellum: motor coordination
• Medulla oblongata: mediation of sensory and motor functions.
• Corpora quadrigemina: (Containing interior and superior  colliculi) : vision
• Spinal cord: conduction
• Nerves: excitation

Sherrington concluded that underlying this reflex activity are the critical processes of inhibitory and expectatory action at the region between nerve cells; he labeled these junctions Synapses.
Sherrington used the method of extirpation in his studies. Complex reflexes were described in terms of the synaptic chain of converging pathways. His concept of excitatory and inhibitory processes forms a central place in our understanding of brain-behavior relationships and comprises the cornerstone of conditioning theory.