[120] The objects which are distinguished by sight, the noblest of the senses, participate in the number of which we are speaking, if classified by their kinds: for the kinds which are seen are seven—body, extension, shape, size, colour, movement, quiescence, and beside these there is no other.
[121] The varieties of the voice too are seven in all, the acute, the grave, the circumflex, and fourthly the rough (or “aspirated”), and fifthly the thin (or “unaspirated”) utterance, and sixthly the long, and seventhly the short sound.
[122] Likewise there are seven movements, upward, downward, to the right, to the left, forward, backward, in a circle. These come out most distinctly in an exhibition of dancing.
[123] The discharges from the body also (it has been pointed out) are limited to the number named: for through the eyes tears pour out, through the nostrils purgings from the head, through the mouth expectorations of phlegm: there are also two receptacles for excretion of superfluities, one in front, one behind; and in the sixth place there is perspiration exuding through the whole body, and in the seventh place the natural normal emission of seed through the genital organs.
[124] Further Hippocrates, that expert in the processes of nature, says that in seven days both the solidifying of the seed and the formation of the embryo take place. Once again, for women the duration of the monthly cleansing is at the most seven days. Moreover the fruit of the womb is brought by nature to full ripeness in seven months, with a most strange result, namely that seven months’ children come to the birth, whereas eight months’ children as a rule fail to do so alive.
[125] Severe bodily sicknesses too, especially persistent attacks of fever due to internal disorder, generally reach the crisis on the seventh day; for this day decides the struggle for life, bringing to some recovery, to others death.