264 ANIMALCULA OF INFUSIONS. T« 



combined a£lion of the projeftile force and gra- 

 vity in fire-works. Thus does our Epigenefifl 

 undertake to penetrate the myftery of the repro- 

 dudion of animated beings, by fubftituting oc- 

 cult qualities in the place of found philofophy. 

 He feems to treat natural hiftory as alchemifts do 

 chemiftry. He fpeaks of the do£trine of germs 

 as a monflrous hypothefis : he thinks he is fup- 

 ported by the great Leibnitz : but no one is igno- 

 rant that this illuftrious metaphyfician was a mod 

 zealous favourer of the theory of germs. You 

 have feen what I fay after him, Palingene/te^ part 

 7. how pointed it is. There is alfo another 

 paflage of the fame profound philofopher ftill 

 more applicable, in his Conjtderations on the Prin- 

 ciples of Life- and Plafiic 'Nature. * With Mt 

 SCudworth, I think the laws of mechanifm a- 



* lone cannot form an animal, where there is yet ■ 

 ' nothing organized ; and I find that he juftly-; 

 ' oppofes what fome of the ancients have faid on 

 ' this fubjed, and even M. Defcartes in his 

 ' Man^ whofe formation cofts him fo little, bur 



* he approaches as little to a real man. And I- 

 ^ confirm Cudworth's fentiments, which confider' 

 ' that matter, arranged by a Divine Wifdom, muft- 

 ' be effentialiy organized throughout ; that there- 

 ' is thus a machine to infinity in the parts 

 ' of the natural machine ; and fo many en- 

 ' velopes and organic bodies involved in eacli: 



* other^ 



