426 GENERATION. SECT. XXXIX. 9. i. 



parts of the growing fetus, as the ikin, nails, hair, and the or- 

 gans which diflinguifh the fexes. 



If the molecules fecreted by the female organ into the peri- 

 carp of flowers, or into the ovary of animals, were fuppofed to 

 confifl: of only unorganized or inanimate particles ; and the fi- 

 brils fecreted by the male organ only to poflefs formative appe- 

 tencies to felecl: and combine with them ; the new embryon 

 mud probably have always refembled the father, and no mules 

 could have had exiftence. 



But by the theory above delivered it appears, that the new 

 offspring, both in vegetable and animal reproduction, whether 

 it be a mule or not, muft fometimes more refemble the male 

 parent, and fometimes the female one, and fometimes to be a 

 combination of them both, as in the Epigram of Aufonius. 



Dum dubitat Natura marem, faceretne puellam 

 Fadtus es, O pulcher, pene puella, Puer ! 



IX. i. The foregoing remarks on vegetable generation are 

 chiefly tranfcribed from my work on Phytologia, Seel:. VII. and 

 may be applied to animal reproduction , fince from this analo- 

 gy to the lateral propagation of vegetable buds, if we fuppofe, 

 that redundant fibrils with formative appetencies are produced 

 by, or detached from, various parts of the male animal, and cir- 

 culating in his blood, are fecreted by adapted glands, and con- 

 ftitute the feminal fluid ; and that redundant molecules with 

 formative aptitudes or propenfities are produced by, or detached 

 from, various parts of the female, and circulating in her blood, 

 are fecreted by adapted glands, and form a refervoir in the ova- 

 ry ; and finally that when thefe formative fibrils, and forma- 

 tive molecules, become mixed together in the uterus, that they 

 coalefce or embrace each other, and form different parts of the 

 new embryon, as in the cicatricula of the impregnated egg ; we 

 may more readily comprehend fome circumftances, which are 

 difficult to underftand on any other fyftem of generation. 



It muil be obferved that this theory differs from that of M. 

 Buffon ; as he conceives the fame organized particles to exift 

 in the generative fecretions both of the male and female par- 

 ent j whereas in this theory it is fuppofed, that particles com- 

 pletely organized are too large to pafs the glands of either fex, 

 and that thofe, which are feen in the femen by microfcopes, are 

 the confequence of the ftagnation of the fluid, as in the puftules 

 of the itch, and in the liquid feces of dyfenteric patients. Hence 

 the fibrils with formative appetencies and the molecules with 

 formative aptitudes or propenfities muft coalefce to produce the 

 firft organization. 



Secondly, 



