Book 3
2
Now those parts of the animal which are especially hollow and large are the stomach and the organ which is called the womb or uterus.The Greek words for the uterus (metrae and hysterae) probably owe their plural form to the belief that the organ was bicornuate in the human, as it is in some of the lower species. What prevents us, then, from taking up these first and considering their activities, conducting the enquiry on our own persons in regard to those activities which are obvious without dissection, and, in the case of those which are more obscure, dissecting animals which are near to man;Note this expression. For Galen's views on the origin of species, cf. Introduction, p. xxxi., footnote. not that even animals unlike him will not show, in a general way, the faculty in question, but because in this manner we may find out at once what is common to all and what is peculiar to ourselves, and so may become more resourceful in the diagnosis and treatment of disease.
2
Now it is impossible to speak of both organs at once, so we shall deal with each in turn, beginning with the one which is capable of demonstrating the retentive faculty most plainly. For the stomach retains the food until it has quite digested it, and the uterus retains the embryo until it brings it to completion, but the time taken for the completion of the embryo is many times more than that for the digestion of food.
PART 3
