Page:Micrographia - or some physiological descriptions of minute bodies made by magnifying glasses with observations and inquiries thereupon.djvu/189

Rh infest all kind of Trees, shrubs, and the like, especially when they come to any bigness. And this we see to be very much the method of Nature throughout its operations, putrifactive Vegetables very often producing a Vegetable of a much less compounded nature, and of a much inferiour tribe; and putrefactive animal substances degenerating into some kind of animal production of a much inferiour rank, and of a more simple nature.

Thus we find the humours and substances of the body, upon putrifaction, to produce strange kinds of moving Vermine: the putrifaction of the slimes and juices of the Stomack and Guts, produce Worms almost like Earth-worms, the Wheals in childrens hands produce a little Worm, call'd a Wheal-worm: The bloud and milk, and other humours, produce other kinds of Worms, at least, if we may believe what is deliver'd to us by very famous Authors; though, I confess, I have not yet been able to discover such my self.

And whereas it may seem strange that Vinegar, Meal, musty Casks, &c. are observ'd to breed their differing kinds of Insects, or living creatures, whereas they being Vegetable substances, seem to be of an inferiour kind, and so unable to produce a creature more noble, or of a more compounded nature then they themselves are of, and so without some concurrent seminal principle, may be thought utterly unfit for such an operation; I must add, that we cannot presently positively say, there are no animal substances, either mediately, as by the soil or fatning of the Plant from whence they sprung, or more immediately, by the real mixture or composition of such substances, join'd with them; or perchance some kind of Insect, in such places where such kind of putrifying or fermenting bodies are, may, by a certain instinct of nature, eject some sort of seminal principle, which cooperating with various kinds of putrifying substances, may produce various kinds of Insects, or Animate bodies: For we find in most sorts of those lower degrees of Animate bodies, that the putrifying substances on which these Eggs, Seeds, or seminal principles are cast by the Insect, become, as it were, the Matrices or Wombs that conduce very much to their generation, and may perchance also to their variation and alteration, much after the same manner, as, by strange and unnatural copulations, several new kinds of Animals are produc'd, as Mules, and the like, which are usually call'd Monstrous, because a little unusual, though many of them have all their principal parts as perfectly shap'd and adapted for their peculiar uses, as any of the most perfect Animals. If therefore the putrifying body, on which any kind of seminal or vital principle chances to be cast, become somewhat more then meerly a nursing and fostering helper in the generation and production of any kind of Animate body, the more neer it approaches the true nature of a Womb, the more power will it have on the by-blow it incloses. But of this somewhat more in the description of the Water-gnat. Perhaps some more accurate Enquiries and Observations about these matters might bring the Question to some certainty, which would be of no small concern in Natural Philosophy.

But that putrifying animal substances may produce animals of an inferior Rh