The Female Physician / Containing all the diseases incident to that sex, in virgins, wives, and widows; together with their causes and symptoms, their degrees of danger, and respective methods of prevention and cure: to which is added, the whole art of new improv'd midwifery; comprehending the necessary qualifications of a midwife, and particular directions for laying women, in all cases of difficult and preternatural births; together with the diet and regimen of both the mother and child.

by John Maubray

HENCE arises a rational and natural Argument, that as Soul and Body do not only act in and thro’ one another, but also suffer mutually, always sympathizing with each other, and bearing equal Share in the Troubles, Misfortunes, and Inquietudes of this Life; and that as they both inseparably constitute the Man: So, by reason of that natural Sympathy, and proximous Affinity, as the Soul enjoys Immortality, the renew’d Body (by the Mystery of the Resurrection) will be a future Partaker of the same Reward; and consequently the whole Man must enjoy one and the same State of Beatitude; or otherways, as he shall have promerited. Whence I proceed to

CHAP. VII.
Of the Formation of the EMBRYO.

THE spirituous Substance of both Seeds, by its own generative and active Qualities, in a well disposed Womb, produceth a small Consistence within the Space of Seven Days, call’d the Genitura; which contains three[^[13]] Bullæ (so term’d by Physicians) superlatively Minute, design’d for the three Spermatick Members: The one containing the purer Part of the Seed, full of Vital Spirit, for the Heart; the other, the more thick and pinguid Part, full of Natural Spirit, for the Liver; and the third, the more cold and crude Part, full of Animal Spirit, for the Brain.

ACCORDING to[^[14]] Hippocrates’s Definition of the Genitura, it appears the likest of any Thing to a raw immature Egg, inclosing a certain red Liquor, with some pale-colour’d Fibres, of the finest Contexture, not unlike the Filaments of a small Spider’s Web, wrap’d up with the said red thick Blood in the Pellicule.

BUT in this place I must farther observe, that the abovesaid spirituous Substance, in which the effective Virtue of Conception resides, is endued with four distinct Faculties, which perfect as many different Operations, all subordinately effected in the Constitution of the Conception, viz.

I. THE animatïve or vivificating Faculty of the Menstruum, called by some the first Constitutive Faculty of Conception, operating, as above, in Seven Days; which is otherwise term’d the Time of Spumification, Lactation, or Coagulation.

II. THE separative or severing Faculty of the Parts of the grosser Materials of the Conception, destinated for the respective Constitution of the different Organical Members; which, being the Work of the next Eight or Ten Days, is perfected about the 15th or 17th Day from Conception; and this is called the Time of Lineation or Ramification, when the Genitura receives the Name of Embryo.

III. THE collocative or ordinating Faculty of all the severed material Parts of the different Members, disposing and placing them according to the Law of Nature, in due Order, Figure, and Situation; which, happening the following[^[15]] Twelve or Fifteen Days, about the 27th or 32d Day from Conception, is called the Time of Carnification; when the Embryo receives the Name of Foetus.

NOW according to the Maxims of Astrology, as all inferiour Bodies are govern’d and influenced by Superiours, so the Seven Planets have Dominion over the Man, not only from the Day of Birth, but also from the Moment of Conception; yet not All at one and the same Time, but every one in their Order, reigning each its peculiar Month. According to which Principles, Saturn reigns the first Month, suppeditating the humid and liquid Substance of the Genitura and Embryo, through his frigid and siccid Quality’s due Coagulation for generating the Man; by virtue of whose Siccity the uterine Retentions also happen.