Arcana microcosmi, or, The hid secrets of man's body discovered in an anatomical duel between Aristotle and Galen concerning the parts thereof : as also, by a discovery of the strange and marveilous diseases, symptomes & accidents of man's body : with a refutation of Doctor Brown's Vulgar errors, the Lord Bacon's natural history, and Doctor Harvy's book, De generatione, Comenius, and others : whereto is annexed a letter from Doctor Pr. to the author, and his answer thereto, touching Doctor Harvy's book De Generatione / by A.R.

CAP. IV.

1. What the spirits are. 2. They differ in seven things. 3. The Wo∣man is only passive in generation: Her Testicles, Arteries, &c. not spermatical parts; the males seed evaporates, why the child resembles the parents; the bloud may be called seed. 4. Adeps how generated. Of the Lungs, they are hot.

THE Animal and Vital Spirits are so called, not only because we have sense and life by them, but also because they first have life and animation in themselves; for otherwise how could the soul give life and sense to the body by these which are not (as some think) capable of either. 2. These spirits are parts of our bodies, parts, I say, not solid and containing, but fluxil and contained. 3. They are one with the vessels & members, to which they do adhere; one, not specifically, but quantitatively; so the grisle is one with the bone that ends in the grisle. 4. These spirits are not the same with the vapours that are in our bodies: For the vapours are excrements, and hurtful to us, therefore nature strives to expel them; but the spirits are parts, & helpful to us, therfore nature labors to retain them. 5. These spirits som∣times are extinguished by violence, somtimes are wasted for de∣fect of food and maintenance; he that is drowned hath his spi∣rits extinguished, he that dieth of sicknesse, hath his spirits wasted. Thus the flame in the candle by the wind is extinguish∣ed, by the defect of wax it is wasted: the quantity remains in that, it is lost in this.

II. The Animal, Vital, and Natural spirits are distinct in their

originals; for the animals are from the brain, the vital from the heart, the natural from the liver. 2. In their Vessels; for the animal are in the nerves, the vital in the arteries, the na∣tural in the veins. 3. In their operations; from the animal we have sense and motion; from the vital, life; from the natural auction and nutrition. 4. The vital spirits remain when the animal and natural are gone. In a Palsie there is neither sense nor motion; in an Atrophy there is neither auction nor nutri∣tition; and consequently, neither animal, nor natural spirits, and yet there is life and vital spirits. 5. The Natural spirits are in every part of the body, so are not the Animal and Vital, but in their proper vessels. 6. The motion of the Animal spi∣rits is voluntary, and in our power, so is not the motion of the other spirits. 7. The Animal spirits rest in sleep, the Vital and Natural are then most active. 8. The Animal spirits are subject to fatigation and cessation, the others not. 9. In Vegitables there are Natural and Vital spirits, but not Animal; in imper∣fect Animals there are all three, but grosser and colder, there∣fore not so apt to be dissipated.

III. That there is no active seed in the female for generati∣on, but that she is meerly passive, in furnishing only the Matter or Menstruous bloud with the place of conception, is accor∣ding to Aristotle manifest; because if the females seed were active, she may conceive of her self without the help of the male, seeing she hath an active and a passive principle, to wit, seed and bloud; and where these principles are, there will be action and passion. If the Galenists object, that the females seed is colder then the males, and therefore not procreative without it; I answer, That though it be colder then the males, yet it is hotter then the bloud, and therefore active, the bloud being meerly passive. Again, the heat of the males seed is but an acci∣dent, no ways concurring essentially to generation, but only by way of fomenting and cherishing the females seed, as the heat of the Hen doth to the generation or production of the Partridg; wheras the whole power and faculty of generation, was in the Egg, not in the Hen: & so by this opinion, the males seed affords nothing but heat or fomentation. 2. If the females seed bee a∣ctive, and the males too, it will follow, that two efficients nu∣merically different, and having no subordination to each other, do produce one effect, which is absurd. 3. It will follow, that there are three material causes, to wit, the males seed, the fe∣males, and the bloud, and therefore must be three forms; for one form hath but one matter. 4. It will follow, that the female

is perfecter then the male, as having more principles of genera∣tion, to wit, the seed, the bloud, and the place or matrix. 5. And in this respect, that the male will stand more in need of the female, then she of him, he being more indigent of these prin∣ciples of generation then she, and having a greater desire to perpetrate the species then she. 6. The Galenists are mistaken, in thinking those glandulous substances in the female to bee te∣sticles containing seed, whereas they are kernels to receive the superfluous moisture of the matrix. 7. The arteries, nerves, and veins, are not spermatical parts; for of the seed no parts are procreated, but they are sanguineal, as the flesh differing from the flesh in this, that being cut, they do not unite again, as the flesh, because of their hardnesse and drinesse, and want of that moisture which is in the flesh. 8. The males seed be∣ing received into the menstruous bloud, doth evaporate and turn into spirits, animating the informed masse. 9. The child sometimes resembleth the Father, sometimes the Mo∣ther, according to the predominancy of the seed or the bloud. 10. As the bloud nourisheth the nerves, veins, &c. so it may be transformed into them. 11. The bloud may be called seed, because the seed is begot of it; and as in Vegitables, Hearbs and Trees are begot of seed, so in animals, procreati∣on is of the bloud. Hence Christ is called the Seed of the Woman.

IV. The Adeps or fat in our bodies is generated, not by heat, for heat dissolves and melts it. 2. Coldest temperaments are fattest, as Women are fatter commonly then men, in Winter▪ creatures are fatter then in Summer, in cold more then in hot Climats men are fatter; English and Dutch are fatter then Ita∣lians or Spaniards. 3. Fat adheres only to the colder parts, as the membranes: Nor is it generated by cold; For, 1. No part of our body is actually cold, but hot. 2. The Kidneys and heart, which are very hot, have far adhering to them. 3. Melancholy men, and old men, who are cold, have little or no fat. It remains then, that the Adeps is begot of a tem∣perate heat, which in respect of a greater heat may be called cold; as the brain in respect of the heart. And nature hath placed the fat next to the cold membranous parts, for cherish∣ing of them; so the far of the Cawle was chiefly ordained for fomenting of the stomach, which is oftentimes wasted by the excessive heat of the liver. Hence it is, that a hot li∣ver is accompanied with a cold stomach: for the hot liver like a cupping glafse, sucks and draws the heat of the neighbouring parts to it.

V. When we consider the cold flegm with which the lungs are still infested. 2. The office of them, which is to refrige∣rate the heart. 3. Their colour, which is whitish; we would think that they were of a cold constitution. On the other side, when we 1. look upon their light and spongy substance; 2▪ on their office, which is to temper and warm the cold air, that it may not offend the heart: 3. On their nu∣triment, which is the cholerick or bilious bloud, we would think they were hot of constitution; and indeed so they are, and cold only by accident, by reason of the external air, and water from the brain, and other parts.