SPONTANEOUS GENERATION. 43 



from decomposing animal or vegetable matter, some- 

 times from the slime of the earth. Many insects, he 

 tells us, spring from putrid matter ; certain fish have 

 their origin in mud and sand, while eels, we are as- 

 sured, are spontaneously produced in marshy 

 ponds. 1 Aristotle's views were shared by his coun- 

 trymen as well as by the Romans by poets and 

 philosophers as well as by naturalists. Pliny and 

 Varro speak of spontaneous generation as do also 

 Virgil and Lucretius and Ovid. All readers of Ovid 

 are familiar with the interesting account given in 

 the " Metamorphoses" of the origin of bees, hornets 

 and scorpions from putrid flesh, of frogs from slime, 

 and of serpents from human marrow. * 



Entertaining such notions regarding the origin 

 of living things, we can understand why Rome's 

 poet-philosopher declares " It remains, therefore, to 

 believe that the earth must justly have obtained 

 the name of mother, since from the earth all living 



1 See his " History of Animals," book V, chap, i, and book 

 VI, chaps, xiv and xv. 



2 " Si qua fides rebus tamen est addenda probatis, 

 Nonne vides, quaecumque mora fluidove calore 

 Corpora tabuerint, in parva animalia verti? 

 I quoque, delectos mactatos obrue tauros; 

 Cognita res usu, de putri viscere passim 

 Florrilegce nascuntur apes . . . 

 Pressus humo bellator equus crabronis origo est. 

 Concava littoreo si demas brachia cancro; 

 Cetera supponas terrae ; de parte sepulta 

 Scorpius exibit 

 ********* 



Semina limus habet viridea generantia ranas. 

 ********* 



Sunt qui, cum clauso putrefacta est spina sepulchre, 

 Mutari credant humunas angue medullas." 



Ovid, " Metamorphoses," Lib. XV., vv. 361, et seq. 



