PART IV. 



THE REPRODUCTIVE FUNCTIONS. 



Chapter I. 



REPRODUCTION. 



Limits have been assigned to the duration of all 

 living beings. The same power to whom they 

 owe their creation, their organization, and their 

 endowments, has also subjected them to the in- 

 exorable Law of Mortality; and has ordained 

 that the series of actions which characterise the 

 state of life, shall continue for a definite period 

 only, and shall then terminate. The very same 

 causes which, at the earlier stages of their exist- 

 ence, promoted their developement and growth, 

 and which, at a maturer age, sustained the 

 vigour and energies of the system, produce, by 

 their continued and silent operation, gradual 

 changes in the balance of the functions, and, at 

 a later period, effect the slow demolition of the 

 fabric they had raised, and the successive de- 

 struction of the faculties they had originally 



