198 Mr. Sprxce’s Monograph of the Genus Choleva. 
least as many species are already described ; and when we com- 
bine the circumstances that in Dritain not fewer than 8000 species 
of insects are to be found, while we have but about 3000 plants; 
that these are probably not one half of the European insects, while 
we know that every other quarter of the globe is still more pro- 
lific in species wholly different; and lastly, that every kind of 
piant probably affords nutriment on the average to three or four 
species of insects, there can be little doubt that the insect is 
vastly more populous than the vegetable world. Is it likely, 
then, that the number of genera should be much fewer than in 
Botany; or at any rate that it should not very greatly exceed 
its present amount ? —We. need not fear that the science will be 
rendered more difficult by an augmentation of its genera. This 
cannot happen if a proper system be adopted. If two or three 
insects, or even a single one, be strikingly characterized by pe- 
culiarity of habit, they certainly ought in any system to be di- 
stinguished at least as sections of the genera under which they 
are placed. And will it increase the difficulty of investigation 
if they be established as genera upon the same characters, and 
distinguished by a name? Clearly not. On the contrary, the 
science can be effectually promoted in no other way; for names 
Tave an important influence upon the clearness of our ideas, and 
it will be impossible for us ever to gain correct views of the 
philosophy of our science, while genera essentially distinct are 
jumbled together under one title. 
Entomology, therefore, is under the ER, obligation .to 
llliger in Germany, and Latreille in France, who having had the 
good sense to reject the useless while they retain the valuable 
parts of Fabricius’s system, are labouring, by the institution of 
new genera built upon firm and intelligible characters, to extri- — 
cate the science from the chaos into which that author has un- 
wittingly 
