say that there is a soul in the Blood and seeing it is the first begotten first moved first nourished why should we doubt to affirm that the soul is first raised kindled out of it Blood is that wherein the Vegetal and sensative operations first shine forth in which the primary and immediate officer of the soul is bred which is the common tye of soul and body and in which as in her Chariot the soul visits and scattereth influence upon all the parts of the body Besides since the contemplation of Geniture is as we have seen already so difficult namely how the fabrick of the body should be built by it with providence art and divine understanding why should we not by the same right admire the excellent nature of blood and harbour as worthy thoughts concerning it as seed especially seeing the Geniture it self as appears by the egge is made of the blood and all the whole body as from its Genital part seems not onely to desume its first Foundation but Preservation also from it Thus much by the way concerning this matter being to treat more fully and exactly of it elsewhere Nor do I conceive it worth the trouble to dispute here whether the definition of a part in its proper acceptation agree to blood which some deny upon these grounds chiefly because it hath not sense and because it flowes and insinuates into all the parts of the body to cater convenient dyet for them But I have found many things about the manner of Generation by which being convinced I shall establish the contrary to those things which Philosophers Physitians commonly affirm or deny At present I will onely say that in case we should consent that the blood hath not sense yet it cannot be thence inferred that it is no part of the sensitive body and that the chifest too For neither the Braine nor the Spinal Marrow or the Crystalline or Glassie humour of the Eye have any sense and yet all Philosophers and Physitians do to this day with one consent allow them to be parts of the body But Aristotle did number it amongst the similar parts and Hippocrates also for while he constitutes the Animal body out of conteining and conteined parts and impetum facientibus spirits he did necessarily own the blood amongst the conteined parts But of this more at large when we enquire what a part is and how many several acceptations there are of it In the mean time we will not conceale this Admirable Experiment by which it shall appear that the most principal member of all namely the very Heart it self may seem to be insensible A Noble young Gentleman Son and Heire to the honorable the Vice-Count of Mountgomery in Ireland when he was a childe had a strange mishapp by an unexpected fall causing a Fracture in the Ribs on the left side the Bruise was brought to a Suppuration whereby a great quantity of putrified matter was voided out and this putrefaction gushed out for a long while together out of the wide wound I deliver it from his own mouth and the testimony of other creditable persons who were eye-witnesses This person of Honour about the eighteenth or nineteenth year of his Age having been a Traveller in Italy and France arrived at last at London having all this time a very wide gap open in his Breast so that you might see and touch his Lungs as it was believed Which when it came to the late King Charles his ear being related as a miracle He presently sent me to the Young Gentleman to inform Him how the matter stood Well what happened When I came neer him and saw him a sprightly Youth with a good complexion and habit of body I supposed some body or other had framed an untruth But having saluted him as the manner is and declared unto him the Cause of my Visit by the Kings Command he discovered all to me and opened the void part of his left side taking off that small plate which he wore to defend it against any blow or outward injury Where I presently beheld a vast hole in his breast into which I could easily put my three Fore-fingers and my Thumb and at the first entrance I perceived a certain fleshy part sticking out which was driven in and out by a reciprocal motion whereupon I gently handled it in my hand Being now amazed at the novelty of the thing I search it again and again and having diligently enough enquired into all it was evident that that old and vast Ulcer for want of the help of a skilfull Physitian was miraculously healed and skinned over with a membrane on the Inside and guarded with flesh all about the brimmes or margent of it But that fleshy substance which at the first sight I conceived to be proud flesh and every body else took to be a lobe of the Lungs by its pulse and the differences or rythme thereof or the time which it kept and laying one hand upon his wrest and the other upon his heart and also by comparing and considering his Respirations I concluded it to be no part of the Lungs but the Cone or Substance of the Heart which an excrescent fungous Substance as is usual in soul Ulcers had fenced outwardly like a Sconce The Young Gentlemans Man did by dayly warm injections deliver that fleshy accretion from the filth pollutions which grew about it and so clapt on the Plate which was no sooner done but his Master was well and ready for any journey or exercise living a pleasant and secure life Therefore instead of an Account of the Business I brought the Young Gentleman himself to our late King that he might see and handle this strange and singular Accident with his own Senses namely the Heart and its Ventricles in their own pulsation in a young and sprigtly Gentleman without offense to him Whereupon the King himself consented with me That the Heart is deprived of the Sense of Feeling For the Party perceived not that we touched him at all but meerly by seeing us or by the sensation of the outward skin We likewise took notice of the motion of his Heart namely that in the Diastole it was drawn in and retracted and in the Systole came forth and was thrust out and that the Systole was made in the heart when the Diastole was sensible in the wrest and also that the proper motion of the heart is the Systole and lastly that the heart then beats upon the breast and is a litle prominent when it is lifted upwards and contracted into it self Nor is that other Controversie namely whether the Blood do onely serve to nourish the Body to be much insisted upon in this place Aristotle indeed doth in several places contend that the blood is Alimentum ultimum the last Aliment and with him the whole School of Physitians give suffrage And yet many things hard to be unfolded and of bad coherence will ensue upon that opinion For when
and grow big and for the most part they teem even by the voice of the cock if they be at that time wanton and lustfull and this also may fall out from the cocks flying over them namely if the cock do transmit a fructifying spirit into the Hen. And this happens chiefly in the Spring-time whence the Poet Vere tument terrae genitalia semina poscunt Tum Pater Omnipotens foecundis imbribus aether Conjugis in gremium laetae descendit omnes Magnus alit magno commistus corpore foetus Avia tum resonant avibus virgulta sonoris Et Venerem certis repetunt armenta diebus Earth swells in Spring and fertile seed requires Descending Aether with her vote conspires And fruitful showrs cheer his glad consorts hart Which do to all her Issues growth impart The Desart woods are then the shrill Birds Quire And all Beasts are inflam'd with Venus fire But not long after these kinde dalliances the Parrat which had lived many years sound and healthy grew sick and being much oppressed by many convulsive motions did at length deposite his much lamented spirit in his Mistresses bosom where he had so often sported When dissecting his carkase to finde out the cause of his death I found in the womb an egge almost completed but for want of a Cocke corrupted Which many times befalleth those Birds that are immured in Cages when they covet the society of the Cock. By this and other examples I am induced to believe that the Dunghill-Cock and the Cock-Pheasant doe not onely delight their Hennes by their voices but also do confer something by those very voices to the conception of the egges for even at night some of the Hens at roost with him do bestirre themselves at the Cocks crowing shaking their heads and wings as if possessed by a gentle horrour their senses were ravished as after Coition A certain Fowle as big again as a Swan was not long since brought into Holland out of Java aâ— Island of the East-Indies which fowle the Dutchmen called a Cassoware the figure of this fowle Aldrovandus representeth and saith that the Indians call it Eme it is not cloven-footed as the Ostrich but hath three claws on every foot one of which is armed with so long so hard and so strong a spurre that it will easily pierce through an Incâ—board Now its manner of smiting is forward its body legs and thighes are like an Ostriches but it hath not a broad bill as the Ostrich hath but a rounâ— and black one Instead of a crest it hath upon the head a round extuberant horn it hath no tongue at all eateth any thing without distinction be it stones or coales and those red-hot too likewise pieces of glass it hath two feathers springing out from every quill and those black short and thinne approaching to the nature of hair or down it hath very litle wings and imperfect it is a creature of a horrid aspect and hath long red and blew gils hanging down the neck like a Turkey-Cock This fowle continued in Holland above seven yeares and afterwards Maurice the most Illustrious Prince of Orange sent it with other things for a Present to King James in whose gardens it lived above five yeares but afterward when two Ostriches Cock and Hen chanced to be kept in the same place and the Cassoware oftentimes over-heard them at the act of coition being but in the next pennes where they were fed apart She unexpectedly conceived egges stirred up as I suppose by a certain sympathy from those that were something of the same kin and linage with her yet all that saw her did conjecture she was rather a Cocke then a Henne considering her we apons and martiall provisions One of these egges she laid whole and entire which I opened and found it compleat for it had a white embracing the yolk round about together with the chalazae or specks like hailestones annexed on both sides and also a litle cavity or emptiness in the obtuse end of it there was likewise the cicatricula the litle cicatrice or whitish speck the shell was thick hard and strong which I caused to be made into a cup the top being taken off such as is usually made of the Ostriches egge This egg was something less then an Ostriches egg but every way perfect as I said before yet without all question it was but a subventaneous and an unfruitfull one by reason of the want of a Cock But at the same time as she brought forth the egge I did presage she her self would die and that according to Aristotle who saith That Birds will be sick and dye unless they bring forth which fell out not long after and dissecting her I found an imperfect and corrupt egge in the Upper end of her Uterus which caused her untimely death as I had formerly observed in the Parrat and other Birds Most Birds by how much the more salacious they are so much the more fruitfull are they and sometimes doe without a Cock either from high feeding or some other cause conceive eggs which very seldom are either perfected or brought forth at all without the use of a Cock but they thenoe fall into desperate diseases and at length dye But the Dunghill-henne doth not onely conceive egges but lay them also and those perfect too but yet subventaneous and barren ones So also many of the Insects in whose list are Silk-worms and Butterflies do both conceive and lay egges without conjunction with the male as fishes also but they are all addle and wind-eggs As if it were the same thing for these creatures to be with egge as for virgins to have their wombs grow warm their termes flow their breasts increase and in a word to become marriageable which if they be too long detained from they are assaulted with dangerous symptoms namely hysterical affections or furor Uterinus or else fall into the green sickness and severall other distempers For all Creatures when they are love-struck grow extravagant and if debarred of enjoyment do at length recede much from their usual temper Hence some women grow frantick for love and this extravagancy is so outragious in some that they seem bewitched planet-strucke or possessed And this inconvenience would be frequent did not pious education respect to their reputation and in-bred modesty temper and asswage these inordinate commotions of the minde Of the Privities of a Henne EXER VI. FRom the exterior uterine orifice is the passage to the inner parts and matrix in which the egge is perfected and this passage in other creatures is termed vagina uteri or vulva into which the males penis is transmitted to the matrix But in a Hen this passage is so perplexed and so wrinckled and folded by reason of the laxity of its inward coat that though there be an easie passage from the matrix outward insomuch that a very great egge can come forth without any great difficulty yet that the masculine penis
very Does were in all other points sound and something fat no less then their fellowes which I diffected at the same time About the End of October and the Beginning of November when the Rutting time is now concluded and the Females and Males part company the Uterus began to seem of a lesser bulk in some sooner and in others later and the wall or sides of the inner cavity appeared to tumefie as if it were puffed up for in those places where of late the litle Cells were there did now round gobbets extuberate inwards filling almost the whole capacity so that the sides now seemed to touch one another and glewed as it were together leaving no space vacant between them For as licorish Boyes while they plunder the honey-combs that they may greedily devour the honey have their Lips so stung by the Bees that they swell and grow tumerous and so streighten the gap of their Mouths in the same manner doth the interiour superficies of the Does Uterus become turgid and a most soft and pulpous substance like that of the Braine doth fill the cavity and involve the Caruncles in it And as for the Caruncles themselves they are no bigger then they were before but only appear something paler and as it were maderated or stewed in warm water as the Nurses nipples look presently after the Childe hath had the breast But I could not squeeze out any blood from them as before This interiour superficies of the Uterus being thus swolne it is at that time so tender and smooth as nothing can be more It resembles the softness of the brain it self and when you touch it did not your own eyes give evidence to that touch you would not believe your fingers vere upon it The cavity of the Womb being laied open immediately after the killing of the Deere I have often discovered a slow waving motion such a one as is seen in the bottom of a creeping Snailes belly as if the Womb were Animal in Animali one living creature in another and had a peculiar independent motion of its own Such a kind of motion as this I have as I mentioned but now often observed in the intestines of creatures dissected alive the same may be experimented both by the testimony of the sight and touch in live Dogs and Conies though you dissect them not I have likewise observed the same kind of motion in the Testicles and Scrotum of the Males and I have known some Women whom such palpitations have deluded with the hopes of being with Child But whether in Hysterical affections such as are the Ascent descent contortion of the Uterus the Womb of Women move and stir by such a kind of agitation as whether the Braine also in its conceptions be in like manner moved to and fro as the discovery is very difficult so is it vorthy the attempt A little while after the foresaid Extuberance of the interiour coat of the Uterus begins to shrink and lessen and in some but that is rare a certain purulent matter doth stick to the fides in manner of sweat such as is visible in wounds and ulcers when they are said to be Concocted and cast forth a white smooth and equall matter When I first discovered this kind of substance I was in suspence whether I should conceit it to be the seed of the Male or some concocted substance arising from it But because I did observe this matter but seldom and in few onely and also seeing twenty days were now past since any commerce with the male had been celebrated and likewise for as much as this substance was not thick clammy or froathy as seed is but more friable and purulent inclining to yellow I concluded that it arrived thither casually rather or else proceeded from over much sweat the Deere being newly quite spent in the chace and so in a Rheume falling down into the Nose the thinner portion of the Catarrh being thickened into a mucous substance puts on a yellow complexion This alteration in the Womb when I had often discovered to His Majesties sight as the first assay towards impregnation and having likewise plainly shewed that all this while no portion of seed or conception either was to be found in the Womb and when the King himself had communicated the same as a very wonderful thing to diverse of his followers a great debate at length arose The Keepers and the Huntsmen concluded first that this did imply that their conception would be late that year thereupon accused the drougth but afterwards when they understood that the rutting time was past and gone and that I stood stiffly upon that they peremptorily did affirm that I was first mistaken my selfe and so had drawn the King into my error and that it could not possibly be but that something at lest of the Conception must needs appear in the Uterus untill at last being confuted by their own eyes they sate down in a gaze and gave it over for granted But all the Kings Physitians persisted stiffly that it could no waies be that a conception should go forward unless the males seed did remain in the womb and that there should be nothing at all residing in the Vterus after a fruitfull and effectuall Coition this they ranked amongst their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now that this experiment which is of so great concern might appear the more evident to posterity His Majestie for tryal-sake because they have all the same time and manner of conception did at the beginning of October separate about a dozen Does from the society of the Buck and lock them up in the Course neer Hampton Court Now lest any one might affirm that doubtlessly these did continue the seed bestowed upon them in Coition their time of Rutting being then not past I dissected diverse of them and discovered no seed at all residing in their Vterus and yet those whom I dissected not did conceive by the virtue of their former Coition as by Contagion and did Fawn at their appointed time In Bitches Conies and several other Animals I have certainly discovered that nothing after Coition is to be found in their Vterus for many daies together In so much that I am very well ascertained that in Viviparous as well as in Oviparous creatures the Foetus doth neither proceed from the Seed of Male and Female emitted in Coition nor yet from any commixture of that seed as the Physitians will have it nor yet out of the Menstruous blood as Aristotle conceits and likewise that there is not any thing of the conception necessarily in being presently after Coition And hence it follows that it is not true that in a prolifical coition any matter is ready at hand in the Vterus which matter or substance the Masculine seed should concoct coagulate and fashion or reduce into an actual generation or by drying its outward Superficies Form and After-birth to wrap it in For nothing at all is to be