Book 5
3
ARISTOTLE says, that seed is that thing which contains in itself a power of moving, whereby it is enabled to produce a being like unto that from whence it was emitted. Pythagoras, that seed is the sediment of that which nourisheth us, the froth of the purest blood, of the same nature as the blood and marrow of our bodies. Alcmaeon, that it is a part of the brain. Plato, that it is the deflux of the spinal marrow. Epicurus, that it is a fragment torn from the body and soul. Democritus, that it proceeds from all the parts of the body, and chiefly from the principal parts. as the flesh and muscles.
Chapter IV. WHETHER THE SPERM BE A BODY.
4
LEUCIPPUS and Zeno say, that it is a body and a fragment of the soul. Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle, that the spermatic faculty is incorporeal, as the mind is which moves the body; but the effused matter is corporeal. Strato and Democritus, that the very power is a body; for it is like spirit.
Chapter V. WHETHER WOMEN DO GIVE A SPERMATIC EMISSION AS MEN DO.
5
PYTHAGORAS, Epicurus, and Democritus say, that women have a seminal projection, but their spermatic vessels are inverted; and it is this that makes them have a venereal appetite. Aristotle and Plato, that they emit a material moisture, as sweat we see produced by exercise and labor; but that moisture has no spermatic power. Hippo, that women have a seminal emission, but not after the mode of men; it contributes nothing to generation, for it falls without the matrix; and therefore some women without coition, especially widows, give the seed. The same also asserts that from men the bones, from women the flesh proceeds.
Chapter VI. HOW IT IS THAT CONCEPTIONS ARE MADE.
