Leibnitz's monads are among the philosophical ancestors of fractals. Each monad contains the entire universe, and so all other monads. A variant of this idea is taken up in "The Aleph" by Borges. We quote from George Montgomery's translation of Leibnitz's Monadology
56. Now this interconnection, relationship, or this adaptation of all things to each particular one, and of each one to all the rest, brings it about that every simple substance has relations which express all the others and that it is consequently a perpetual living mirror of the universe.
57. And as the same city regarded from different sides appears entirely different, and is, as it were multiplied respectively, so, because of the infinite number of simple substances, there are a similar infinite number of universes which are, nevertheless, only the aspects of a single one as seen from the special point of view of each monad.
58. Through this means has been obtained the greatest possible variety, together with the greatest order that may be; that is to say, through this means has been obtained the greatest possible perfection.
67. Every portion of matter may be conceived as like a garden full of plants and like a pond full of fish. But each branch of each plant, every member of an animal, and every drop of fluid within it, is also such a garden or pond.
68. And although the ground and air which lies between the plants of the garden, and the water which is between the fish of the pond, are not themselves plants or fish, yet they nevertheless contain these, usually so small however as to be imperceptible to us.