I 1 
bility talked of a Scale of Nature, in which (he, by 
an infenfible Tranfttion, palled from the moll per- 
fect of Animals, not only to the moft impeded, and 
thence to the moft impeded of Vegetables, but 
even through Coralline Bodies, and Minerals, to the 
very Earths and Stones, which feem the moft ina- 
nimate Parts of our Globe. 
Now in fuch a Scale, who is the Man that will be 
bold to fay, Juft here Animal Life intirely ends, and 
here Vegetable Life begins ? Or, Juft thus far, and no 
further, one fort of Operations goes, and juft here 
another fort quite different takes its Place ? Or, 
again, Who will venture to fay, Life in every Ani- 
mal is a Thing abfolutely different from that which 
we dignify by the fame Name in every Vegetable? 
And might not a Man even be excufed, if he fhould 
modeftly doubt, whether Plants and Vegetables may 
not themfelves be conlidered as a very low and im- 
peded Tribe of Animals ; as Animals might, in like 
manner, be confidered as a more perfed and exalted 
kind of Vegetables ? 
We fee the Two Sexes of Male and Female run 
through all the higher Parts of the Animal Creation 5 
yet would he have gone a great deal too far, who 
fhould have thence alfcrted, there were no Exceptions 
to this general Oeconomy ; or that this was one of 
the general and diftinguifhing Affedions of all the 
Animal Kind : For modern Difcoveries have informed 
us, that there is fomewhat very analogous to this in 
the Vegetable Creation alfo: And even in the Ani- 
mal it has been found, that Snails, Earth-worms, and 
fome others, are really Hermaphrodites, having in 
themfelves the Organs of both Sexes j whilft the work- 
