declares its powers and performs its actions. For being seated in the
highest parts of the body it diffuses its force into every member. It is
not propagated from the parents, nor mixed with gross matter, but the
infused breath of God, immediately proceeding from Him; not passing from
one to another as was the opinion of Pythagoras, who held a belief in
transmigration of the soul; but that the soul is given to every infant
by infusion, is the most received and orthodox opinion. And the learned
do likewise agree that this is done when the infant is perfected in the
womb, which happens about the twenty-fourth day after conception;
especially for males, who are generally born at the end of nine months;
but in females, who are not so soon formed and perfected, through defect
of heat, until the fiftieth day. And though this day in either case
cannot be truly set down, yet Hippocrates has given his opinion, that it
is so when the child is formed and begins to move, when born in due
season. In his book of the nature of infants, he says, if it be a male
and be perfect on the thirtieth day, and move on the seventieth, he will
be born in the seventh month; but if he be perfectly formed on the
thirty-fifth day, he will move on the seventieth and will be born in the
eighth month. Again, if he be perfectly formed on the forty-fifth day,
he will move on the ninetieth and be born in the ninth month. Now from
these paring of days and months, it plainly appears that the day of
forming being doubled, makes up the day of moving, and the day, three
times reckoned, makes up the day of birth. As thus, when thirty-five
perfects the form, if you double it, makes seventy the day of motion;
and three times seventy amounts to two hundred and ten days; while
allowing thirty days to a month makes seven months, and so you must
consider the rest. But as to a female the case is different; for it is
longer perfecting in the womb, the mother ever going longer with a girl
than with a boy, which makes the account differ; for a female formed in
thirty days does not move until the seventieth day, and is born in the