GREEK BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE 



since they were unable to penetrate therein 

 and to reach and handle all portions of the 

 material. It is not so, however, with Nature. 

 Every part of a bone she makes bone, every 

 part of the flesh she makes flesh, and so with 

 fat and all the rest; there is no part which she 

 has not touched, elaborated, and embellished. 

 Phidias, on the other hand, could not turn wax 

 into ivory and gold, nor yet gold into wax: 

 for each of these remains as it was at the 

 commencement and becomes a perfect statue 

 simply by being clothed externally in a form 

 and artificial shape. But Nature does not pre- 

 serve the original character of any kind of 

 matter; if she did so, then all parts of the 

 animal would be blood, — that blood, namely, 

 which flows to the semen from the impregnated 

 female, and which is, so to speak, like the 

 statuary's wax, a single uniform matter, sub- 

 jected to the artificer. From this there arises 

 no part of the animal which is as red and moist 

 [as blood is], for bone, artery, vein, nerve, 

 cartilage, fat, gland, membrane, and marrow 

 are not blood, though they arise from it." 



These passages are from the opening chap- 

 ters of the second book. The last part of the 

 first book and the remainder of book two 



[118] 



