Note Book IX. Chap. 1. Note (a) — BOOK IX.

[a] Notwithstanding I have before, in Book IV. Chap. 12. Note (p), taken Notice of the Earth-Worm; yet it being a good Example of the Creator’s wise and curious Workmanship, in even this meanest Branch of the Creation, I shall superadd a few farther Remarks from Drs. Willis and Tyson. Saith Willis, Lumbricus terrestris, licet vile & contemptibile habetur, Organa vitalia, necnon & alia viscera, & membra divino artificio admirabiliter fabrefacta sortitur: totius corporis compages musculorum annularium catena est, quorum fibræ orbiculares contractæ quemque annulum, prius amplum, & dilatum, angustiorem & longiorem reddunt. [This Muscle in Earth-Worms, I find is spiral, as in a good Measure is their Motion likewise; so that by this Means they can, (like the Worm of an Augre,) the better bore their Passage into the Earth. Their reptile Motion also, may be explain’d by a Wire wound on a Cylinder, which when slipp’d off, and one End extended and held fast, will bring the other nearer it. So the Earth-Worm, having shot out, or extended its Body, (which is with a Wreathing,) it takes hold by those small Feet it hath, and so contracts the hinder Part of its Body. Thus the curious and learned Dr. Tyson, Phil. Trans. Nᵒ. 147.] Nam proinde cùm portio corporis superior elongata, & exporrecta, ad spatium alterius extenditur, ibidemque plano affigitur, ad ipsum quasi ad centrum portio corporis inferior relaxata, & abbreviata facile pertrabitur. Pedunculi serie quadruplici, per totam longitudinem Lumbrici disponuntur; his quasi totidem uncis, partem modò hanc, modò istam, plano affigit, dum alteram exporrigit, aut post se ducit. Supra oris hiatum, Proboscide, quâ terram perforat & elevat, donatur. And then he goes on with the other Parts that fall under View, the Brain, the Gullet, the Heart, the spermatick Vessels, the Stomachs and Intestines, the Foramina on the Top of the Back, adjoyning to each Ring, supplying the Place of Lungs, and other Parts. Willis de Anim. Brut. P. 1. c. 3.