That a Bear brings forth her young informous and unshapen, which she fashioneth after by licking them over, is an opinion not only vulgar, and common with us at present: but hath been of old delivered by ancient Writers. Upon this foundation it was an Hieroglyphick with the Egyptians: _Aristotle_ seems to countenance it; _Solinus_, _Pliny_, and _Ælian_ directly affirm it, and _Ovid_ smoothly delivereth it: _Nec catulus partu quem reddidit ursa recenti_ _Sed male viva caro est, lambendo mater in artus_ _Ducit, et in formam qualem cupit ipsa reducit._ Which notwithstanding is not only repugnant unto the sense of every one that shall enquire into it, but the exact and deliberate experiment of three Authentick Philosophers. The first of _Mathiolus_ in his Comment on _Dioscorides_, whose words are to this effect. In the Valley of _Anania_ about _Trent_, in a Bear which the Hunters eventerated or opened, I beheld the young ones with all their parts distinct: and not without shape, as many conceive; giving more credit unto _Aristotle_ and _Pliny_, then experience and their proper senses. Of the same assurance was _Julius Scaliger_ in his Exercitations, _Ursam fœtus informes potius ejicere, quam parere, si vera dicunt, quos postea linctu effingat: Quid hujusce fabulæ authoribus fidei habendum ex hac historia cognosces; In nostris Alpibus venatores fætum Ursam cepere, dissecta ea fætus plane formatus intus inventus est_. And lastly, Aldrovandus who from the testimony of his own eyes affirmeth, that in the Cabinet of the Senate of _Bononia_, there was preserved in a Glass a Cub taken out of a Bear perfectly formed, and compleat in every part. It is moreover injurious unto Reason, and much impugneth the course and providence of Nature, to conceive a birth should be ordained before there is a formation. For the conformation of parts is necessarily required, not onely unto the pre-requisites and previous conditions of birth, as Motion and Animation: but also unto the parturition or very birth it self: Wherein not only the Dam, but the younglings play their parts; and the cause and act of exclusion proceedeth from them both. For the exclusion of Animals is not meerly passive like that of Eggs, nor the total action of delivery to be imputed unto the Mother: but the first attempt beginneth from the Infant: which at the accomplished period attempteth to change his Mansion: and strugling to come forth, dilacerates and breaks those parts which restrained him before.