Chapter II: Madam,

I understand by your last, that you have read the Book of that most learned and famous Physician and Anatomist, Dr. _Harvey_, which treats of Generation; and in the reading of it, you have mark'd several scruples, which you have framed into several questions concerning that subject, to which you desire my answer. Truly, _Madam_, I am loth to imbarque my self in this difficult argument, not onely for the reasons I have given you heretofore, but also that I do not find my self able enough to give you such a satisfactory answer as perhaps you do expect. But since your Commands are so powerful with me, that I can hardly resist them, and your Nature so good that you easily pardon any thing that is amiss, I will venture upon it according to the strength of my Natural Reason, and endeavour to give you my opinion as well and as clearly as I can. Your first question is; _Whether the action of one or more producers be the onely cause of Natural Production or Generation, without imparting or transferring any of their own substance or Matter._ I answer: The sole co-action of the Producers may make a change of exterior forms or figures, but not produce another Creature; for if there were not substance or matter, as well as action, both transferred together, there would not be new Creatures made out of old Matter, but every production would require new Matter, which is impossible, if there be but one Matter, and that infinite; and certainly, humane sense and reason may well perceive, that there can be but one Matter, for several kinds of Matter would make a confusion; and thus if new Creatures were made onely by substanceless motion, it would not onely be an infinite trouble to Nature, to create something out of nothing perpetually, but, as I said, it would make a confusion amongst all Nature's works, which are her several Parts or Creatures. But by reason there is but one Matter, which is Infinite and Eternal, and this Matter has self-motion in it, both Matter and Motion must of necessity transmigrate, or be transferred together without any separation, as being but one thing, to wit, Corporeal Motion. 'Tis true, one part of animate or self-moving Matter, may without Translation move, or rather occasion other parts to move; but one Creature cannot naturally produce another without the transferring of its corporeal motions. But it is well to be observed, that there is great difference between the actions of Nature; for all actions are not generating, but some are patterning, and some transforming, and the like; and as for the transforming action, that may be without translation, as being nothing else but a change of motions in one and the same part or parts of Matter, to wit, when the same parts of Matter do change into several figures, and return into the same figures again. Also the action of Patterning is without Translation; for to pattern out, is nothing else but to imitate, and to make a figure in its own substance or parts of Matter like another figure. But in generation every producer doth transfer both Matter and Motion, that is, Corporeal Motion into the produced; and if there be more producers then one, they all do contribute to the produced; and if one Creature produces many Creatures, those many Creatures do partake more or less of their producer. But you may say, If the producer transfers its own Matter, or rather its own corporeal motions into the produced, many productions will soon dissolve the producer, and he will become a sacrifice to his off-spring. I answer; That doth not follow: for as one or more Creatures contribute to one or more other Creatures, so other Creatures do contribute to them, although not after one and the same manner or way, but after divers manners or ways; but all manners and ways must be by translation to repair and assist; for no Creature can subsist alone and of it self, but all Creatures traffick and commerce from and to each other, and must of necessity do so, since they are all parts of the same Matter: Neither can Motion subsist without Matter, nor quit Matter, nor act without Matter, no more, then an Artificer can work without materials, and without self-motion Matter would be dead and useless; Wherefore Matter and Motion must upon necessity not onely be inseparable, but be one body, to wit, corporeal motion; which motion by dividing and composing its several parts, and acting variously, is the cause of all Production, Generation, Metamorphosing, or any other thing that is done in Nature. But if, according to your _Author_, the sole action be the cause of Generation without transferring of substance, then Matter is useless, and of none or little effect; which, in my opinion, is not probable.

Your second question is, _Whether the Production or Generation of animals is as the Conceptions of the Brain, which the Learned say are Immaterial?_ I answer: The Conceptions of the Brain, in my opinion, are not Immaterial, but Corporeal; for though the corporeal motions of the brain, or the matter of its conceptions, is invisible to humane Creatures, and that when the brain is dissected, there is no such matter found, yet that doth not prove, that there is no Matter, because it is not so gross a substance as to be perceptible by our exterior senses: Neither will your _Authors_ example hold, that as a builder erects a house according to his conception in the brain, the same happens in all other natural productions or generations; for, in my opinion, the house is materially made in the brain, which is the conception of the builder, although not of such gross materials, as Stone, Brick, Wood, and the like, yet of such matter as is the Rational Matter, that is, the house when it is conceived in the brain, is made by the rational corporeal figurative motions of their own substance or degree of Matter; But if all Animals should be produced by meer fancies, and a Man and a Woman should beget by fancying themselves together in copulation, then the produced would be a true Platonick Child; But if a Woman being from her Husband should be so got with Child, the question is, whether the Husband would own the Child; and if amorous Lovers (which are more contagious for appetite and fancy then Married persons) should produce Children by Immaterial contagions, there would be more Children then Parents to own them.

Your third question is, _Whether Animals may not be produced, as many Diseases are, by contagion?_ I answer: Although contagions may be made at a distance, by perception; yet those diseases are not begotten by immaterial motions, but by the rational and sensitive corporeal motions, which work such diseases in the body of a Creature, by the association of parts, like as the same disease is made in another body: Neither are diseases always produced after one and the same manner, but after divers manners; whereas animals are produced as animals, that is, after one natural and proper way; for although all the effects in particular be not alike, yet the general way or manner to produce those effects is the same: As for example; there is no other way to produce a fruitful Egg, but by a Cock and a Hen; But a Contagious disease, as the small-Pox, or the like, may be produced by the way of Surfeits or by Conceit, which may cause the sensitive corporeal parts, through the irregular motions of the rational corporeal parts, to work and produce such a disease, or any other ways. But neither a disease, nor no creature else can be produced without matter, by substanceless motion; for wheresoever is motion, there is also matter, matter and motion being but one thing.

Your fourth question is, _Whether an Animal Creature is perfectly shaped or formed at the first Conception?_ I answer: If the Creature be composed of many and different parts, my opinion is, it cannot be. You may say, That if it hath not all his parts produced at there will be required many acts of generation to beget or produce every part, otherwise the producers would not be the Parents of the produced in whole, but in part. I answer: The Producer is the designer, architect, and founder of the whole Creature produced; for the sensitive and rational corporeal motions, which are transferred from the producer or producers, joyn to build the produced like to the producer in specie, but the transferred parts may be invisible and insensible to humane Creatures, both through their purity and little quantity, until the produced is framed to some visible degree; for a stately building may proceed from a small beginning, neither can humane sense tell what manner of building is designed at the first foundation. But you may say, That many Eggs may be made by one act of the producers, to wit, the Cock and the Hen, and those many Eggs may be laid at several times, as also hatched at several times, and become Chickens at several times. I answer; It may well and easily be so: for the rational and sensitive parts or corporeal motions which were transferred in one act, designed many produced through that one act; for those transferred corporeal motions, although they have not a sufficient quantity of themselves to make all the produced in their perfect shapes at once, yet they are the chief designer, architect and founder of all that are to be produced; for the corporeal motions which are transferred, joyn with those they are transferred to, and being associates, work to one design, the sensitive being the architect, the rational the designer, which together with the inanimate parts of matter, can never want materials, neither can the materials want labourers; for the degrees of matter are inseparable, and do make but one body or substance. Again you may say, That some parts of Matter may produce another Creature not like to the producer in its species, as for example, Monsters. I answer, That is possible to be done, but yet it is not usual; for Monsters are not commonly born, but those corporeal motions which dwell in one species, work according to the nature of the same species; and when the parts of Matter are transferred from Creature to Creature, that is, are separated from some parts, and joyned to other parts of the same species, and the same nature; those transferred parts of matter, although invisible in quantity, by reason of their purity and subtilty, begin the work of the produced according to its natural species, and the labourers in other parts of matter work to the same end; just as it is in the artificial building of a house, where the house is first designed by the Architect, or Master, and then the labourers work not after their own fancy, (else it would not be the same house that was designed, nor any uniformity in it) but according to the architects or surveyors design; so those parts of matter or corporeal motions that are transferred from the producer, are like the architect, but the labourers or workmen are the assisting and adjoyning parts of matter. But you will say, How comes it, that many creatures may be made by one or two? I answer: As one owner or two partners may be the cause of many buildings, so few or more transferred rational and sensitive corporeal motions may make and produce as many creatures as they can get materials and labourers; for if they get one, they get the other, by reason the degrees of matter, _viz._ animate and inanimate, are inseparably mixt, and make but one body or substance; and the proof of it is, that all animals are not constant in the number of their off-spring, but sometimes produce more, and sometimes fewer, and sometimes their off-spring is less, and sometimes larger, according to the quantity of matter. Again you may say, That in some Creatures there is no passage to receive the transferred matter into the place of the architecture. I answer: That all passages are not visible to humane sense; and some humane Creatures have not a sufficient humane reason to conceive, that most of Natures works are not so gross as to be subject to their exterior senses; but as for such parts and passages, whether exterior or interior, visible or invisible, as also for copulation, conception, formation, nourishment, and the like in Generation, I leave you to Physicians and Anatomists. And to conclude this question, we may observe, that not any animal Creatures shape dissolveth in one instant of time, but by degrees; why should we believe then, that Animals are generated or produced in their perfect shape in one instant of time, and by one act of Nature? But sense and reason knows by observation, that an animal Creature requires more time to be generated, then to be dissolved, like as an house is sooner and with less pains pull'd down, then built up.

Your Fifth question is, _Whether Animals are not generated by the way of Metamorphosing?_ To which I answer, That it is not possible that a third Creature can be made without translation of corporeal motions; and since Metamorphosing is onely a change of motions in the same parts of Matter, without any translation of corporeal motions, no animal Creature can be produced or generated by the way of Metamorphosing.

Your Sixth question is, _Whether a whole may be made out of a part?_ I answer: There is no whole in Nature, except you will call Nature her self a whole; for all Creatures are but parts of Infinite Matter.

Your Seventh question is, _Whether all Animals, as also Vegetables, are made or generated by the way of Eggs?_ I have said heretofore, That it is not probable, that different sorts, nay, different kinds of Creatures, should all have but one manner or way of production; for why should not Nature make different ways of productions, as well as different Creatures? And as for Vegetables, if all their Seeds be likened unto Eggs, then Eggs may very well be likened to Seeds; which if so, then a Peas-cod is the Hen, and the Peas in the Cod is the cluster of Eggs: the like of ears of Corn. And those animals that produce but one creature or seed at a time, may be like the kernel of a Nut, when the shell is broke, the creature comes forth. But how this will agree with your _Author_, who says, that the creature in the shell must make its own passage, I cannot tell; for if the Nut be not broken by some external means or occasion, the kernel is not like to get forth. And as for humane Eggs, I know not what to answer; for it is said, that the first Woman was made of a mans ribb; but whether that ribb was an egg, I cannot tell. And why may not Minerals and Elements be produced by the way of Eggs as well as Vegetables and Animals? Nay, why may not the whole World be likened unto an Egg? Which if so, the two Poles are the two ends the Egg; and for the Elements, the Yolk is the Fire, the White, the Water; the Film, the Air; and the Shell it self will very well serve for the Earth: But then it must first be broken, and pounded into one lump or solid mass, and so sink or swim into the midst of the liquid parts, as to the Center; and as for the several foetuses in this great Egg, they are the several Creatures in it. Or it might be said, that the Chaos was an Egg, and the Universe, the Chicken. But leaving this similizing, it is like, that some studious Men may by long study upon one part of the body, conceive and believe that all other parts are like that one part; like as those that have gazed long upon the Sun, all they see for a time, are Suns to them; or like as those which having heard much of Hobgoblins, all they see are Hobgoblins, their fancies making such things. But, _Madam_, to make a conclusion also of this question, I repeat what I said before, that all Creatures have not one way of production; and as they have not all one way of production, so they have neither one instant of time either for perfection or dissolution, but their perfection and dissolution is made by degrees.

Your Eighth question is, _Whether it may not be, that the sensitive and rational corporeal motions in an Egg do pattern out the figure of the Hen and Cock, whilest the Hen sits upon the Egg, and so bring forth Chickens by the way of patterning?_ I answer: The action of patterning, is not the action of Generation; for as I said heretofore, the actions of Nature are different, and Generation must needs be performed by the way of translation, which translation is not required in the action of Patterning; but according as the Producers are, which transfer their own matter into the produced, so is the produced concerning its species; which is plainly proved by common examples; for if Pheasants, or Turky, or Goose-eggs, be laid under an ordinary Hen, or an ordinary Hens-egg be laid under a Pheasant, Turky, or Goose, the Chickens of those Eggs will never be of any other species then of those that produced the Egg; for an ordinary Hen, if she sit upon Pheasants, Turky, or Goose-eggs, doth not hatch Chickens of her own species, but the Chickens will be of the species either of the Pheasant, or Turky, or Goose, which did at first produce the Egg; which proves, that in Generation, or Natural production, there is not onely required the action of the Producers, but also a Transferring of some of their own parts to form the produced. But you may say, What doth the sitting Hen contribute then to the production of the Chicken? I answer: The sitting Hen doth onely assist the Egg in the production of the Chicken, as the Ground doth the Seed.

Your Ninth question is, _Concerning the Soul of a particular Animal Creature, as whether it be wholly of it self and subsists wholly in and by it self?_ But you must give me leave first to ask you what Soul you mean, whether the Divine, or the Natural Soul, for there is great difference betwixt them, although not the least that ever I heard, rightly examined and distinguished; and if you mean the Divine Soul, I shall desire you to excuse me, for that belongs to Divines, and not to Natural Philosophers; neither am I so presumptuous as to intrench upon their sacred order. But as for the Natural Soul, the Learned have divided it into three parts, to wit, the Vegetative, Sensitive, and Rational Soul; and according to these three Souls, made three kinds of lives, as the Vegetative, Sensitive, and Rational Life. But they might as well say, there are infinite bodies, lives, and souls, as three; for in Nature there is but one life, soul, and body, consisting all of one Matter, which is corporeal Nature. But yet by reason this life and soul is material, it is divided into numerous parts, which make numerous lives and souls in every particular Creature; for each particular part of the rational self-moving Matter, is each particular soul in each particular Creature, but all those parts considered in general, make but one soul of Nature; and as this self-moving Rational Matter hath power to unite its parts, so it hath ability or power to divide its united parts. And thus the rational soul of every particular Creature is composed of parts, (I mean parts of a material substance; for whatsoever is substanceless and incorporeal, belongs not to Nature, but is Supernatural;) for by reason the Infinite and Onely matter is by self-motion divided into self-parts, not any Creature can have a soul without parts; neither can the souls of Creatures subsist without commerce of other rational parts, no more then one body can subsist without the assistance of other bodies; for all parts belong to one body, which is Nature: nay, if any thing could subsist of it self, it were a God, and not a Creature: Wherefore not any Creature can challenge a soul absolutely to himself, unless Man, who hath a divine soul, which no other Creature hath. But that which makes so many confusions and disputes amongst learned men is, that they conceive, first, there is no rational soul but onely in man; next, that this rational soul in every man is individable. But if the rational soul is material, as certainly to all sense and reason it is, then it must not onely be in all material Creatures, but be dividable too; for all that is material or corporeal hath parts, and is dividable, and therefore there is no such thing in any one Creature as one intire soul; nay, we might as well say, there is but one Creature in Nature, as say, there is but one individable natural soul in one Creature.

Your Tenth question is, _Whether Souls are producible, or can be produced?_ I answer: in my opinion, they are producible, by reason all parts in Nature are so. But mistake me not; for I do not mean that any one part is produced out of Nothing, or out of new matter; but one Creature is produced by another, by the dividing and uniting, joyning and disjoyning of the several parts of Matter, and not by substanceless Motion out of new Matter. And because there is not any thing in Nature, that has an absolute subsistence of it self, each Creature is a producer, as well as a produced, in some kind or other; for no part of Nature can subsist single, and without reference and assistance of each other, or else every single part would not onely be a whole of it self, but be as a God without controle; and though one part is not another part, yet one part belongs to another part, and all parts to one whole, and that whole to all the parts, which whole is one corporeal Nature. And thus, as I said before, productions of one or more creatures, by one or more producers, without matter, meerly by immaterial motions, are impossible, to wit, that something should be made or produced out of nothing; for if this were so, there would consequently be an annihilation or turning into nothing, and those creatures, which produce others by the way of immaterial motions, would rather be as a God, then a part of Nature, or Natural Matter. Besides, it would be an endless labour, and more trouble to create particular Creatures out of nothing, then a World at once; whereas now it is easie for Nature to create by production and transmigration; and therefore it is not probable, that any one Creature hath a particular life, soul, or body to it self, as subsisting by it self, and as it were precised from the rest, having its own subsistence without the assistance of any other; nor is it probable, that any one Creature is new, for all that is, was, and shall be, till the Omnipotent God disposes Nature otherwise.

As for the rest of your questions, as whether the Sun be the cause of all motions, and of all natural productions; and whether the life of a Creature be onely in the blood, or whether it have its beginning from the blood, or whether the blood be the chief architect of an animal, or be the seat of the soul; sense and reason, in my opinion, doth plainly contradict them; for concerning the blood, if it were the seat of the Soul, then in the circulation of the blood, if the Soul hath a brain, it would become very dizzie by its turning round; but perchance some may think the Soul to be a Sun, and the Blood the Zodiack, and the body the Globe of the Earth, which the Soul surrounds in such time as the Blood is flowing about. And so leaving those similizing Fancies, I'le add no more, but repeat what I said in the beginning, that I rely upon the goodness of your Nature, from which I hope for pardon, if I have not so exactly and solidly answered your desire; for the argument of this discourse being so difficult, may easily lead me into an error, which your better judgment will soon correct; and in so doing you will add to those favours for which I am already,

Madam,

_Your Ladiships most obliged Friend_

_and humble Servant._