Having given a description of the organs of generation in women, with the anatomy of the fabric of the womb, I shall now, in order to finish the first part of this treatise, describe the organs of generation in men, and how they are fitted for the use for which Nature intended them.
The instrument of generation in men (commonly called the yard, in Latin, penis, from pendo, to hang, because it hangs outside the belly), is an organic part which consists of skin, tendons, veins, arteries, sinews and great ligaments; and is long and round, and on the upper side flattish, seated under the os pubis, and ordained by Nature partly for the evacuation of urine, and partly for conveying the
seed into the womb; for which purpose it is full of small pores, through which the seed passes into it, through the vesicula seminalis, [[4]] and discharges the urine when they make water; besides the common parts, viz., the two nervous bodies, the septum, the urethra, the glans, four muscles and the vessels. The nervous bodies (so called) are surrounded with a thick white, penetrable membrane, but their inner substance is spongy, and consists chiefly of veins, arteries, and nervous fibres, interwoven like a net. And when the nerves are filled with animal vigour and the arteries with hot, eager blood, the penis becomes distended and erect; also the neck of the vesicula urinalis, [[5]] but when the influx of blood ceases, and when it is absorbed by the veins, the penis becomes limp and flabby. Below those nervous bodies is the urethra, and whenever they swell, it swells also. The penis has four muscles; two shorter ones springing from the Cox endix and which serve for erection, and on that account they are called erectores; two larger, coming from sphincters ani, which serve to dilate the urethra so as to discharge the semen, and these are called dilatantes, or wideners. At the end of the penis is the glans,
covered with a very thin membrane, by means of which, and of its nervous substance, it becomes most extremely sensitive, and is the principal seat of pleasure in copulation. The outer covering of the glans is called the preputium (foreskin), which the Jews cut off in circumcision, and it is fastened by the lower part of it to the glans. The penis is also provided with veins, arteries and nerves.
The testiculi, stones or testicles (so called because they testify one to be a man), turn the blood, which is brought to them by the spermatic arteries into seed. They have two sorts of covering, common and proper; there are two of the common, which enfold both the testes. The outer common coat, consists of the cuticula, or true skin, and is called the scrotum, and hangs from the abdomen like a purse; the inner is the membrana carnosa. There are also two proper coats—the outer called cliotrodes, or virginales; the inner albugidia; in the outer the cremaster is inserted. The epididemes, or prostatae are fixed to the upper part of the testes, and from them spring the vasa deferentia, or ejaculatoria, which deposit the seed into the vesicule seminales when they come near the neck of the bladder. There are two of these vesiculae, each like a bunch of grapes, which emit the seed into the urethra
in the act of copulation. Near them are the prostatae, about the size of a walnut, and joined to the neck of the bladder. Medical writers do not agree about the use of them, but most are of the opinion that they produce an oily and sloppy discharge to besmear the urethra so as to defend it against the pungency of the seed and urine. But the vessels which convey the blood to the testes, from which the seed is made, are the arteriae spermaticae and there are two of them also. There are likewise two veins, which carry off the remaining blood, and which are called venae spermaticae.
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