376 ON GENERATION. 



portion of the body, because the pulse has its commencement 

 in and through it; but also because animal heat originates in 

 it, and the vital spirit is associated with it, and it constitutes 

 the vital principle itself, (ipsa anima) ; for wheresoever the im- 

 mediate and principal instrument of the vegetative faculty is 

 first discovered, there also does it seem likely will the living 

 principle be found to reside, and thence take its rise ; seeing 

 that the life is inseparable from spirit and innate heat. 



For " however distinct are the artist and the instrument 

 in things made by art," as Fabricius l well reminds us, " in the 

 works of nature they are still conjoined and one. Thus the 

 stomach is the author and the organ of chylopoesis." In like 

 manner are the vital principle and its instrument immediately 

 conjoined ; and so, in whatever part of the body heat and motion 

 have their origin, in this also must life take its rise, in this be 

 last extinguished ; and no one, I presume, will doubt that there 

 are the lares and penates of life enshrined, that there the vital 

 principle (anima) itself has its seat. 



The life, therefore, resides in the blood, (as we are also in- 

 formed in our sacred writings,) 2 because in it life and the soul 

 first show themselves, and last become extinct. For I have 

 frequently found, from the dissection of living animals, as I 

 have said, that the heart of an animal that was dying, that 

 was dead, and had ceased to breathe, still continued to pulsate 

 for a time, and retained its vitality. The ventricles failing and 

 coming to a stand, the motion still goes on in the auricles, and 

 finally in the right auricle alone ; and even when all motion 

 has ceased, there the blood may still be seen affected with a 

 kind of undulation and obscure palpitation or tremor, the last 

 evidence of life. Every one, indeed, may perceive that the 

 blood this author of pulsation and life, longest retains its 

 heat ; for when this is gone, and it is no longer blood, but 

 gore, so is there, then, no hope of a return to life. But, truly, 

 as has been stated, both in the chick in ovo and in the mori- 

 bund animal, if you but apply some gentle stimulus either to 

 the punctum saliens or to the right auricle of the heart after 

 the failure of all pulsation, forthwith you will see motion, pul- 

 sation, and life restored to the blood provided always, be it 



1 Op. Eup. cit. p. 28. 2 Leviticus xvii, 11, 14. 



