Credulities of this Nature, though upon the most insignificant and ill-grounded Assertions, generally make great Progress in the Minds of Men and are sometimes so deeply rooted, that the Vicissitudes of many Ages have not been sufficient to open Mens Eyes, or make them sollicitous for the Truth. Of this Sort was the Notion of Witches in the World; for it is plain from Record, that many poor Women were condemned to the Flames or Gallows by the greatest Sages in the Law; and the Sentences against them were so arbitrary as never to be mitigated, but hurled them to Destruction without the least Regret or Pity from the Witnesses of such Barbarity; and yet how easy would it have been to discern (if Men gave themselves the Liberty to reflect a little upon the Nature of the Thing) that no Guilt, nor any such preternatural Knowledge as was said to center in them, could proceed from those ignorant simple People, that were always the Subjects of this Cruelty. Thus it often fared with our reputed Hermaphrodites, who have been banished, tormented, abused, and employed in such Offices as were in themselves severe; cut off from the common Privileges and Freedoms enjoyed by the Publick wheresoever they have been; yea, and put to Death in an inhuman and pityless Manner. But the Disgrace which hangs over human Nature, from Mens harbouring such strange Notions of one another, is almost as bad; and more especially so, when several who are ranked among Men of Science shall espouse these Chimeras, or at least confess a Doubt concerning the Thing: So that it is not to be wondered at, if the weak-minded and injudicious should be impressed with a Belief of Reports of this Kind, and thereby lose all Humanity towards such Objects; and no wonder modest Ears should be grated with the Stories of such Creatures, since they are more frequently exposed to vast Numbers of the indiscreet Part of the World, than to Men of Knowledge and Decency. Since this is the Case, and since Authors, of no little Account among the Learned, have taken great Pains to confirm the Certainty of the Existence of Hermaphrodites in human Nature, and, at the same Time, differ so much from each other concerning them; it could not but be very well worth while to attempt finding the Truth of what, I so much mistrusted, was asserted without any just Foundation, and what I could not but esteem a Scandal thrown upon the whole Race of Mankind; and therefore, upon seeing the Fœtus whose Description, with an Observation upon all female Fœtus’s, concludes the following Pages, I was the more encouraged to read upon and consider the Subject; and finding myself unable to reconcile the Accounts of Authors to Truth, and the Nature of Hermaphroditism to the Physiology of human Bodies, I was still the more eager to endeavour at being satisfactory to others as well as myself, about what has been so long a Riddle.