GENERATION OF ANIMALS, I. xviu. 



of this sort recur after many generations, as the 

 following instance shows. There was at Elis a woman 

 who had intercourse with a blackamoor ; her daughter 

 was not a black, but that daughter's son was. And 

 the same argument will hold for plants. We should 

 have to say that the seed was drawn from the whole 

 of the plant, just as in animals. But many plants 

 lack certain parts ; vou can if vou wish pull some of 

 the parts off, and some parts grow on afterwards. 

 Further, nothing is drawn from the pericarp to con- 

 tribute to the seed, yet pericarp is formed in the 

 new plant and it has the same fashion as that in 

 the old one. 



Here is a further question. Is the semen drawn 

 dnly from each of the " uniform " parts of the body, 

 such as flesh, bone, sinew, or is it drawn from the 

 " non-uniform " parts as well, such as face and hand ? 

 Consider the possibilities : (1) The semen may be 

 drawn from the uniform parts only. If so, (then 

 children ought to resemble their parents in respect 

 of these only,) but the resemblance occurs rather 

 in the non-uniform parts such as face, hands? and 

 feet. Therefore if even these resemblances in the 

 non-uniform parts are not due to the semen being 

 drawn from the whole body, why must the resem- 

 blances in the uniform parts be due to that and not 

 to some other cause ? (2) The semen may be drawn 

 from the non-uniform parts only. This means that 

 it is not drawn from all the parts. Yet it is more in 

 keeping that it should be drawn from the uniform 

 parts, because they are prior to the non-uniform, 

 and the non-uniform are constructed out of them ; . 

 and just as children are born resembling their parents 

 in face and hands, so they resemble them in flesh and 



55 



