_Pontanus_[62], besides being of the same Opinion with _Averroës_, seems also to lay a great deal of blame to Heat, by which I suppose, he means the Calor Nativus, because he says[63],——he endeavours to make this plain, by likening Generation to a Vessel of Water on a Fire; alledging that a gentle Heat will render the Water hot, as well as an inordinate one; and that, as by a very great Heat, the Water will be subject to a total Evaporation, so the Oeconomy of Generation may be destroyed, or become monstrous or preposterous by the same. Innate Heat is indeed a necessary Quality that attends every Part as well as Action of animal Bodies; but I cannot conceive any Excess of Heat in such Bodies, but what is symptomatick of some morbid State, and therefore not to be assign’d as a Cause for any effect, whether regular or irregular, in Generation. By this Author’s laying so much Stress upon inordinate Heat, one would imagine, he had nothing else to blame for causing Hermaphrodites; yet he joins with _Peucerus_ so as to mention his very Words[64], in consequence of this Notion of a Superfluity of Particles producing more Members than are natural; and makes an offer at explaining this also in the following Manner; however inartful and unreasonable, let every Reader judge[65]. ‘When therefore this acting or procreating Virtue directly influences either Sex, so as to conquer or quite overcome, Women bring forth Children of either Sex; but where she partly conquers and partly is subdued, then the thing is otherwise conducted, and one both Male and Female is begotten.’ By this Manner of accounting for it, we are to suppose, when the _Vis Agens_ chiefly predominates over the Materia Seminalis, the Male Sex is begotten; and when the seminal Matter totally rules the Vis Agens, a Female is produced; but if the latter is partly conquer’d and partly overcomes, then one of both Sexes is the Consequence.