Chap. IV.
The CONCLUSION.
Containing a Description of a Fœtus, and a Recital of the Dissections of such Subjects by some other Authors.
The Examination of any more Authors upon this Topick would amount to more Pains than at present are necessary, and besides, Repetitions could hardly be avoided if any more were called in Question, since we find Authors were so fond of running in the same Path with one another; therefore the Remarks that have been made on those already mentioned may, I hope, be sufficient (together with the rest that has been said) to answer the End of this Treatise, which is no more than to illustrate the Cause of the first Rise of the Notions of Hermaphrodites among Men; to shew how credulous our Ancestors have been of these Chimera’s, and how fond of encouraging their Progress tho’ in the meanest Manner of arguing; to prove, by comparing all the Opinions of Authors, that no hermaphrodital Nature can exist in human Bodies; and, in fine, that those Subjects hitherto so accounted, were only Females in all Respects, superstitiously, and through Ignorance, mistaken for those Kind of Creatures, or for Men; which, with some other Disorders of the Pudenda of either Sex, gave rise to the several Divisions that afterwards sprung up concerning them; as far from Truth (or even rational Conjecture) as any other Error that ever was received by Mankind. And this will still be further illustrated by the following Description of a Fœtus, with a very large Clitoris, that came to my Hands some time since, which I have taken due Care of for this Purpose.
This Subject was an abortive Fœtus of about six Months Growth, in which (though so young) the Pudenda are conspicuous enough, and the Clitoris sufficiently large to prove every Thing that has been said upon the Subject; and to serve as a Standard, wherewith to confront any fabulous Reports that may hereafter spring up in the World, which I have endeavoured to describe in the most faithful Manner that I am capable of.
But before we proceed to this Description, it will be of great Use towards the Design of this little Work, to insert the following Observation; which I had the Honour to lay before the Royal Society on Thursday the 30th of April 1741, and which, I hope, will add no small Force to what has been already said upon it.
All female Fœtus’s, during the greatest Part of the Time of Gestation, have the Clitoris as large in Proportion to their Sizes, and sometimes larger, than the Angolan Woman before-mentioned, which is evident from several then shewed together to the Society; this, I am inclined to believe, is Nature’s common Rule all over the World. Now it is impossible that so many Hermaphrodites should be found at once, since we have so very few Instances among the European Nations of those so reputed; though, as is before observed, they are common enough in Africa and Asia, in all those Places especially that are nearest the Equinoctial Line; where the Nonnaturals themselves conduce much to the general Relaxation of the Solids, and consequently, this unseemly Accretion of that Part.
Now as the Fœtus increases in a natural Way, the neighbouring Parts of the Pudenda grow more in Proportion than the Clitoris, drawing away the Integuments, whereby it becomes by Degrees less conspicuous; but when it continues it’s Growth, together with the rest, maintaining it’s first proportional Size, the Person is reported to be an Hermaphrodite; the natural Structure of this Part being in a great Measure like that of a Penis virilis.
Nor is it’s Largeness in a Fœtus much to be wondered at, since there are other very similar Cases in the same Body, as the Gland Thymus and Glandulæ Renales; nor is it, indeed, any more wonder to find it’s Growth increased, when once continued till a little after Birth; because Erections of that Part begin very early in Children, which, protruding the Integuments, increase their Relaxation, and thereby remove all Obstacles to it’s Luxuriancy.