Academic Theories of Generation in the Renaissance by Linda Deer Richardson & Benjamin Goldberg

Author:Linda Deer Richardson & Benjamin Goldberg
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

2.in viviparous animals, seed is formed at the time of coition, as a result of friction;

3.testes contribute nothing to the production of seed;

4.the male contribution is agent only, dissipates after coitus and forms no part of the foetus; the female contribution is material only;

5.“thus the soul is rightly the work of the male, the body of the female.”12

Telesio’s refutation of these points relies heavily on Galen for its authority and detail – as does, for example, his description of the ‘use’ of the genital parts in chapter 19 of Book VI. Semen is elaborated in the testes of those animals which have them, and prepared in advance, not at the time of coition; furthermore, the impetus to the sexual act comes not from a potentia generativa residing in the heart, but from the amount and qualities of the seed produced in the testis, particularly its ‘biting’, acrid quality and its high spiritus content – both of which promote sexual desire.13

Females as well as males emit a ‘moisture’ which is a true fertile semen, although it is less concocted and concentrated than male seed, because of the lesser heat which women possess. The existence of female seed is proved by the presence of female ‘testes’ and by the pleasure which both sexes feel at the time of ‘emission’. As with the male, however, this pleasure does not mean that female seed is necessarily fertile; the question of what determines the fertility of seed will be considered further below.14

The male seed provides, not the soul or agent power of generation, but a part of the foetus; the white, bloodless, seminal parts of Galen. And the difference between male and female contributions to generation, like the difference in appearance of male and female genital parts, is not due to a difference in kind, but, “as Galen tells us”, simply due to the different degrees of heat in the two sexes. According to Telesio, the two seeds contribute to the foetus by fusion, not as agent and patient – as can be observed in the eggs of fishes and other ovipara, including birds. Thus, “the foetus cannot be constituted from a soul dwelling in the male seed”, as Aristotle’s theory implies.15

Telesio also rejects Aristotle’s claim for the primacy of the heart in generation in favour of the testis; ‘nervous tissue’ (genus nervosum); and the uterus itself, heated by the blood. In Quod animal, he similarly attacks the Aristotelian notion that the heart is the primary organ of the body and source of the nerves.16

As well as refuting these specific points in Aristotle’s account, Telesio tackles a much trickier general question: the operation of the soul in generation. What do we mean when we say that seed is fertile? How, for example, can we distinguish a fertile hen’s egg from an infertile one, since both are produced in the same way and seem identical in composition as well as appearance? If the difference is in the presence or absence of soul or anima – in

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