159 



rears ago, counted upwards of eight thousand grabs, 

 which sprung from a single one. 



After all that has been said and wrote for so many 

 centuries, on the generation or propagation of plants 

 and animals, a late author (to whom the French na- 

 turalists in general subscribe) totally denies the 

 whole, and censures all who pretend to discover any 

 animalcula in the semen of animals. H-- will by no 

 means allow that every animal or plant proceeds 

 from an egg lodged in the parent plant or animal. On 

 the contrary, he supposes, u there are in matter cer* 

 tain organical parts, disposed for the formation of 

 animal and vegetable substances, which by coalition 

 constitute the first stamina of all animal and vegetable 

 bodies. These are simple, uniform, common to all, 

 and consequently to be found more or less in every 

 portion of the nutritive juice. From thence they are 

 digested, and when the subject becomes adult, secreted 

 for the formation of the seed of every plant and ani- 

 mal. These organica) parts, moving wneu disengag- 

 ed, and thence imagines to be alive, are extremely 

 simple in their composition^ being per aps, only elas- 

 tic springs, more or less compressed r nore or Jess diver* 

 siiied in the direction of their force. 



44 All microscopic animals, so calleJ, are indeed no 

 other than such organical particles. Seeds macerated 

 in water, first disunite into small particles, whicn soon 

 after move and seem alive, though they are not so. 

 The same may be observed of the j nces of animals, 

 as mutton gravy and the like. And as to the com. 

 ttHra imagination, that the male semen, while in the 

 vessels, contains millions of animalcula like tadpoles, 

 it is certain they are produced, after the evacuation 

 of the fluid, and rise from, principles contained there- 

 in, by a real vegetation, and a subsequent change 

 from the vegetable to the animal life. 



<; Semen immediately evacuated is an homogenous 

 fluid. In a few moments it begins to sepav.Uo, and 

 after this, a kind of vegetable fil Clients grow in it, 

 and shoot out ramifications on every side, Tiiese open 



