Sentence:  Consequently, all animate objects which do not have distinctive terms for their male and female beings are <WSD>epicenes</WSD> and become masculine or feminine solely by virtue of the addition of gender marker particles denotative of 'male' and 'female' or 'he' and 'she' suffixed to the genderless term. This device of gender distinction, too, is confined to non-human animate beings only. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  An epicene word; "preceded by" '''(the)''': the epicene words of a language as a class.