I Say this is that _Body_, which the _Learned Great Men_ of all Ages have esteem’d and look’d upon as the most wonderful MIRACLE of _Nature_, not only because of its singular _Substance_ and _Structure_, but also of its peculiar _Qualities_ and _Faculties_.
AS to the _Substance_ and _Structure_, I have before observed in _Chap. 6._ of this SECTION, that it is singularly composed, of an innumerable Multitude of _Fibrous Vessels_ and _Muscular Parts_; which being _All_ most curiously interwoven, are admirably form’d together in its Constitution.
BUT how particular soever I have been on this _Head_, in _Chap. 5_, and _6_. I must resume this _Topick_ here, and add, that the WOMB, and its _Vagina_ or _Neck_, are closely join’d together: For it terminates in a POINT near its _Orifice_, intrudes itself into the _Vagina_, and hangs so down, that in _Women not with_ CHILD, and sometimes also in the first Months of _Pregnancy_, This sharp POINT may be perceiv’d by the _Touch_.
AND how closely soever this _Orifice_ of the WOMB is shut after _Conception_ or during _Pregnancy_; yet in a _BIRTH_ it is so expanded, that the WOMB and _Vagina_ both seem to have but _One_ and the _same Cavity_, like a BAG of equal Dimensions; there being then no Difference perceivable between that _Orifice_ and the _Vagina_, excepting that the _VAGINA_ is _Softer_ and _Thinner_.
THE WOMB may be otherwise aptly compar’d to the EARTH; because the same Degree of _Affinity_ that the EARTH has to the _Seed of Plants_, the WOMB bears to the _Seed of Men_: It being the very _Secundary Cause_ in the _Constitution_ of the _Human Conception_; not indeed the _Instrumental_ only, but also the _Active Cause_: For whereas the _Instrument_ takes _Motion_ from, and _operates_ by Virtue of _Another_, the WOMB only _acts_ of _itself_ and _operates_ by Virtue of its own _Active Faculties_.
BUT more particularly, the WOMB has sundry proper _Actions_ in this _Constitution_, which are peculiarly dependent of, and accordingly discharged by ITSELF only; and therefore it is not the sole or pure Instrumental _Agent_. But the Reason that I call it the _Secundary_ or _Disponent_, not the _Primary Cause_, in constituting the FOETUS, is, because the _Actions_ of the WOMB do not precisely terminate in this _Constitution_, but chiefly in disposing the _Causes_ constituting the MAN. And as (I think) there are _Eight_ such _Actions_ belonging to the WOMB, I shall undertake to define them all particularly in a few Words. And,