On Birth — First Draft Translation

1. Custom governs all things. The seed of a man comes from all the fluid present in the body, the strongest part being separated out. The evidence for this — that the strongest part is separated out — is that when we have intercourse and release even a little, we become weak. It is this way: veins and sinews extend from the whole body into the genitals; when these are rubbed and warmed and filled, something like an itching falls upon them, and pleasure and heat come to the whole body from this. When the genitals are rubbed and the person is in motion, the fluid in the body is warmed and spreads and is agitated by the movement and foams — just as all other fluids, when agitated, foam. So too in the human being the strongest and richest part is separated out from the foaming fluid and travels to the spinal marrow; for sinews extend into it from the whole body, and it spreads from the brain into the loins and into the whole body and into the marrow, and from it pathways extend, so that fluid can both enter into it and pass away from it. When the seed arrives at this marrow, it passes along beside the kidneys; for the pathway runs that way through the veins, and if the kidneys are ulcerated, blood is sometimes carried along with it. From the kidneys it travels through the middle of the testicles into the genitals; and it does not travel where the urine goes, but has another pathway of its own alongside that one. Those who experience nocturnal emission do so for this reason: when the fluid dispersed through the body is heated through — whether by exertion or by something else — it foams; and as a part is separated from it, there presents itself to sight the same kind of thing as in intercourse, for this fluid has what occurs in the one having intercourse. But [it is not for me to treat here] of those who have nocturnal emissions — what the whole condition is, and how much it brings about, and why it comes before intercourse. †The sentence breaks off here.† These things have been said by me to this point. 2. Eunuchs do not have intercourse for this reason: their passage for the seed is weakened. For the pathway runs through the testicles themselves; and fine, dense sinews extend from the testicles into the genitals, which are themselves raised and lowered, and these are cut through at the incision — which is why eunuchs are not of use in this way. In those whose testicles have been crushed, the passage of the seed is blocked; for the testicles become callused, and the sinews, having become hard and insensible from the callus, cannot stretch and relax. Those who have been cut behind the ears do have intercourse and emit, but little and weak and without generative power; for the greater part of the seed travels from the head past the ears into the spinal marrow; and this passage has become solid from the scar formed by the incision. In boys, the small veins being full obstruct the passage of the seed, and the itching does not come upon them in the same way; for this reason the fluid in the body is not agitated into a separation of seed. And in girls, so long as they are young, the monthly flow does not come, for the same reason. But when both girl and boy grow, the veins extending toward the genitals — in the boy and in the girl — toward the womb become free-flowing through growth and open at the mouth, and a pathway and passage opens through the narrow parts, and the fluid then receives agitation, for it then gains a wide space in which to be agitated; and in the boy the flow comes, when he is grown, for this reason, and in the girl the monthly flow. These things have been demonstrated by me in this way. 3. I hold that seed is separated out from the whole body — from the solid parts and from the soft parts, and from all the fluid in the body. The forms of fluid are four: blood, bile, water, and phlegm. For the human being has that many forms connatural within himself, and from these diseases arise. I have set out an account of these as well — both of them and of why diseases arise from them, and of the crises that come from diseases. These things have been said by me concerning seed: whence it comes to be, and how, and why; and in whom seed does not come to be, and why it does not; and concerning the monthly flow of girls. 4. I hold that in women, when the genitals are rubbed in intercourse and the womb is in motion, something like an itching falls upon them and pleasure and warmth are brought to the rest of the body. The woman too releases from her body — sometimes into the womb, and the womb becomes moist, and sometimes also outside, if the womb gapes more than is timely. She feels pleasure from the moment she begins intercourse throughout the whole time, until the man withdraws from her. If the woman is urgent to have intercourse, she releases before the man, and thereafter the woman no longer feels pleasure in the same way; but if she is not urgent, pleasure is fulfilled together with the man's. It is like this: as when someone pours cold water onto boiling water, the water stops boiling — so the seed of the man, falling into the womb, quenches the heat and the pleasure of the woman. Pleasure and heat flare up together as the seed falls into the womb, then subside — just as when someone pours wine onto a flame, what happens is that first the flame flares up and increases for a moment at the pouring of the wine, then subsides; in the same way the woman's heat flares up toward the man's seed, then subsides. The woman feels pleasure far less intensely than the man in intercourse, but for a longer time than the man; the reason the man feels greater pleasure is that the separation in him from the fluid takes place suddenly, from a more violent agitation than in the woman. And this too is how it is for women: if they have intercourse with men, they are healthier; if they do not, less so. For in intercourse the womb becomes moist and not dry; when it is dry beyond the timely measure, it contracts strongly, and when it contracts strongly it causes pain to the body. At the same time intercourse, by warming and moistening the blood, makes an easier pathway for the monthly flow; and when the monthly flow does not pass through, the bodies of women become prone to disease. Why they become prone to disease will be said by me in the diseases of women. These things have been said by me to this point. 5. When a woman has intercourse, if she is not going to take the seed to herself, the seed from both parties passes outside in the usual way, whenever the woman wishes. But if she is going to take it to herself, the seed does not pass outside but remains in the womb. For the womb, having received it and closed, holds it within itself — the mouth having been drawn in by the moisture — and what came from the man and what came from the woman are mixed together. And if the woman has experience of childbearing and notices that the seed does not come out but remains within, she will know on which day she received it. 6. And this too is how it is: sometimes what is released from the woman is stronger, sometimes weaker; and what comes from the man likewise. And there is in the man both female seed and male seed, and in the woman likewise. The male is stronger than the female; for it is necessary that what comes from the stronger seed prevails. And this too is how it is: if from both parties the stronger seed comes, a male is produced; if the weaker, a female; whichever prevails by quantity, that is what comes to be. For if the weaker seed is much more plentiful than the stronger, the strong is mastered and, blended with the weak, is turned toward female; but if the strong is more plentiful than the weak, and the weak is mastered, it is turned toward male. It is like someone who mixes wax and tallow together, making the tallow more plentiful, and melts them at a fire: while it is still fluid, the prevailing element is not apparent; but when it has solidified, then it becomes evident that the tallow masters the wax by quantity. So it is with the seed of male and female. 7. What makes it possible to infer that seed both female and male is present in the woman and in the man is what becomes manifest: many women have already borne daughters with their own husbands, and going to other men have borne sons; and those same men with whom the women were bearing daughters, coming into intercourse with other women, produced male offspring; and those with whom male offspring were being produced, mingling with still other women, produced female offspring. This account will show that both the man and the woman carry both female and male seed: for with those with whom they were bearing daughters, the stronger was mastered, the weaker having become more plentiful, and females were produced; with those with whom they were bearing sons, the stronger prevailed, and males were produced. For it does not always come from the same man strong, nor always weak, but different at different times. And it is the same with the woman — so that one need not wonder that the same women and the same men produce both male and female offspring. And with livestock the matter of female and male seed is the same way. 8. And in the seed itself there comes out, from both woman and man, what is from every part of the body — weak from the weak parts and strong from the strong parts — and in this way it is necessarily rendered back to the child. From whatever part of the man's body more comes into the seed than from the woman's, that part more closely resembles the father; from whatever part of the woman's body more comes, that part more closely resembles the mother. It is not possible that everything resembles the mother and nothing the father, or the reverse, or that it resembles neither in anything; but there is a necessity that it resembles both to some degree, if indeed the seed travels from both bodies into the child. Whichever parent contributes more to the resemblance, from more regions of the body, to that parent most parts are like; and it happens that a daughter, when born, more closely resembles her father than her mother in the greater number of parts, and a son when born sometimes more closely resembles his mother than his father. These things and as many of them are for me evidences for the previous account — that the capacity for producing sons and the capacity for producing daughters is present in both the woman and the man. 9. The following also occurs: sometimes children are born slight and weak, from a father and mother who are stout and strong. If this happens when many children have already been born, it is clear that the embryo was diseased in the womb, and was delivered from the mother while its growth was still going out beyond the womb, the womb having gaped more than timely, and for this reason it was born weak; for each of the living beings is diseased according to its own strength. But if all the children born are weak, the womb is the cause, being narrower than the timely measure; for if it does not have the room in which the embryo will be nourished, it is necessary that it become slight, having in its growth not the same spaciousness as when it does have it. If it has spaciousness and is not diseased, it is likely that a large child will be born from large parents. It is this way: just as if someone places a cucumber that has already flowered, still newly formed and attached to the vine, into a ladle, it will become equal and like to the hollow of the ladle; but if someone places it in a large vessel, one that is suitable for holding a cucumber but not much larger than the cucumber's nature, the cucumber will become equal and like to the hollow of the vessel; for in its growth it strives against the hollow of the vessel. Almost all things that grow are this way — however one constrains them. So too it is with the child: if it has spaciousness in its growth, it becomes larger; if it has narrowness, smaller. 10. The child that is maimed in the womb — I hold this happens either by the child itself being crushed, when the mother is struck on the place of the embryo, or she falls, or some other violent event befalls the mother; wherever it is crushed, the child is maimed there. If the embryo is crushed more severely, with the membrane enclosing it being torn, the embryo is destroyed. Or children are maimed in another such way: when the space in the womb at the region where the maiming occurred is narrow, it is necessary that the body, as it moves and grows confined in a narrow space, be maimed at that region — just as those trees that, being in the ground, lack spaciousness and are held in by a stone or by something else, come up crooked, or thick in one part and thin in another. So too it is with the child, if in the womb one part is in a narrower space than another. 11. That the children of maimed people are born healthy is, for the most part, what happens; for the maimed person has all parts in complete count, just as the healthy one does. But when a disease comes upon him and also upon his fluid from which the seed comes — the four forms being present — as many forms as were by nature present do not supply the seed whole, and the part corresponding to the maimed part is weaker; it does not seem to me to be surprising that it should also be maimed, just as the parent was. These things have been said by me to this point; and I will return back again to the account I was giving.