372 SYSTEM OF INSECTS. 
from the mouth ; and Acrita, in which this system is 
molecular*. And to this division of the kingdom, as 
founded on a satisfactory basis, I should recommend you 
to adhere : still however we may speak of vertebrate and 
invertebrate animals, as forming the primary subdivision 
of them, taken from a striking character and obvious to 
every one who sees them. 
If 3:011 inquire into the rank of each of these subking- 
doms, of course you will assign the principal station to 
the Vertebrates, which are the most perfectly organized, 
to which man belongs, and over which he immediately 
presides. If we form the scale according to the nervous 
system of each province, that in which the organ of 
sensation and intellect is most concentrated will stand 
first ; and in proportion as this organ is multiplied and 
dispersed will be the station of the rest, which will place 
them in the order in which I have mentioned them ; and 
the Annulosa, to which insects belong, will precede the 
Mollusca, which Cuvier and Lamarck had placed before 
them on account of their system of circulation. But 
when we reflect that a heart and circulation occur in some 
of the conglomerate Polypi b , animals that approach the 
vegetable kingdom ; that some of the acephalous Mollusca 
have no visible organs of sense, except that of taste, 
whose substance is little better than a homogeneous gela- 
tinous pulp, and who seem from their inert nature to 
have very slight powers of voluntary motion c , we shall 
be convinced that a heart and circulation alone, unaccom- 
panied b3' a more concentrated nervous system and more 
a Hot: Entomolog. 200 — . See above, p. 3—. 
b Savigny Mem. snr les Aram, sans Vertebr. II. i, 3. 
c MacLeay Hor, Ent. 204. 
