The Parents of these could have no other Motive for thinking these Creatures Boys, than the Length of the Clitoris; which is plain from their bearing Children when they came to Age; and if any thing of a Masculine Nature was in the Soldier, it could surely in seven Years Acquaintance have been exerted to the Gratification of a Wife, or would have produced some other Effects very different from that of being got with Child. CHAP. II. _An historical and critical Account of the Causes of Hermaphrodites._ If Hermaphrodites actually existed, sure there might have been before now some probable Conjectures made to shew the Reasons, or Necessity of such Beings upon Earth, since so many Authors have been busy’d about them from the Beginning of the World. But there appears throughout their several Opinions, so general a Train of Absurdities, that I cannot but wonder, they were any more satisfactory to Mankind in their Days than they are to me at present. However, when the several Causes laid down by certain Authors from Time to Time, for the producing of those Creatures, are consider’d, it will not be difficult Matter to point out innumerable Errors amongst them, and deny that those Causes can produce any such Effect as a double Nature in human Bodies. The first then that I shall take notice of is that of _Constantinus Africanus_[42], who accuses Nature of being hindered, or of forgetting its duty in the Formation of the Fœtus, and by this Mistake Hermaphrodites are generated. ‘[43]It happens to some Men, in Generation, to have added to them those Female Parts, and to some Women those Masculine Parts that are luxuriant in them, when Nature is hinder’d, or grows forgetful; for when by any Accident it happens thus, that Superfluity of humid Matter that usually contributes to either the inordinate Size or Number of any Limb, goes to the Formation of a Member of any other Nature without Rule or Order.’ Before we can in any wise understand whether the Cause assigned by this Author be just or not, we must guess at what he means by the Word _Nature_. Amongst the Poets, and some Philosophical Authors, _Natura_ and _Deus_ may be conceived to signify the same Thing; in this Sense, not the least Impediment can be ascribed, nor Oblivion attributed to it. If it be a Term used to hint at the _Vis Formatrix_, or at the Matter of which the Fœtus is form’d, his Reason for giving this as a Cause will appear to be as ill grounded as any other; because as to the latter, all reasonable Men must allow, that as Matter is totally passive, it cannot be said to err or forget; and as to the former, if such an occult Power existed, it must have been by God’s Appointment, and consequently not liable to such Imperfections, in conducting so great a Work as that of Generation, with which so many Authors have taken much pains to charge this Vis Plastica; but of both these in another Place.