Duplicating movie clips from other duplications

Hello. I am currently working on a project where I need to have a movieclip duplicate itself. Then, I need that movieclip, and the duplicated movieclip to duplicate themselves. Giving me four movieclips. and so on and so forth. I tried, but after it duplicates the original once, when it goes for the second duplication, it removes the 1st duplicate and creates another. Help please?