Page:The Works of William Harvey (part 1 of 2).djvu/415

 spirit had been spent, it would forthwith be useless and sterile. Hence, too, physicians may learn that the semen of the male is the architect of the progeny, not because the first conception is embodied out of it, but because it is spiritual and effervescent, as if swelling with a fertilising spirit, and a preternatural in- fluence. For otherwise the story of Averrhoes, of the woman who conceived in a bath, might bear an appearance of truth. But of these things more in their proper place.

In the same manner then as the egg is formed from the hen, so is it probable, that from the females of other animals, as will hereafter be shown, the first conceptions take both ma- terial and form ; and that, too, some little time after the semen of the male has been introduced, and has disappeared again. For the cock does not confer any fecundity on the hen, or her eggs, by the simple emission of his semen, but only in so far as that fluid has a prolific quality, and is imbued with a plastic power; that is to say, is spiritual, operative, and analogous to the essence of the stars. The male, therefore, is no more to be considered the first principle, from which conceptions and the embryo arise, because he is capable of secreting and emit- ting semen, than is the female, which creates an egg without his assistance. But it is on this consideration rather that he is entitled to his prerogative, that he introduces his semen, im- bued as it is with the spirit and the virtue of a divine agent, such as, in a moment of time, performs its functions, and con- veys fertility. For, as we see things suddenly set on fire and blasted by a spark struck from a flint, or the lightning flashing from a cloud, so equally does the seed of the male instantly affect the female which it has touched with a kind of contagion, and transfer to her its prolific quality, by which it renders fruitful in a moment, not only the eggs, but the uterus also, and the hen herself. For an inflammable material is not set on fire by the contact of flame more quickly, than is the hen made pregnant by intercourse with the cock. But what it is that is transferred from him to her, we shall afterwards find occasion to speak of, when we treat this matter specially and at greater length.

In the meantime we must remark, that, if it be derived from the soul, (for whatever is fruitful is probably endowed also with a soul ; and we have said before, that the egg, in