sense, implies casual feelings from within; sight signifies both faculty and function; and nourishment is food as well as digestion. It is somewhat, perhaps, objectionable that Aristotle should have bound up, so to say, the generative with the nutritive function, seeing how they differ both in the periods of development and duration; they are equally necessary, no doubt, to nature's design, but still they are neither contemporaneous nor identical. With respect to spontaneous generation here alluded to Aristotle[1] admitted its possibility, and for obvious reasons, in the case of eels; and, although he denied that all mullets (τοὺς κεστρεῖς φύεσθαι πάντας) are so reproduced, yet he believed that some of the species spring forth (φύεται) from the mud and sand on the sea-shore; and thus it is evident, he continues, that some creatures, not being derived from others, may be the product of spontaneous generation. This opinion upon reproduction prevailed for many ages, and even yet, perhaps, notwithstanding the advancement of science, it may not be altogether discredited.
- ↑ Hist. Ani. vi. 14. 14. 15. 3.
