130 HISTORY OF ENTOMOLOGY. 
1. The Era of the Ancients. 2. The Era of the revival 
of the science after the darkness of the middle ages. 
3. The Era of Swammerdam and Ray, or of the Meta- 
morphotic System. 4. The Era of Linne, or of the Alary 
System. 5. The Era of Fabricius, or of the Maxillary 
Systcin. 6. The Era of Latreille, or of the Eclectic 
System. And 7. The EraofMacLeay, or of the Quinary 
System. All of these appear to form important points, 
or resting-places, in the progress of the science towards 
its acme ; and of each of these I shall now proceed to 
give you a brief account. 
1. The Era of the Ancients. To ascertain what atten- 
tion was paid to insects in the earliest ages, we must 
have recourse to the most ancient of records, the Old 
Testament. In this sacred volume we are informed that 
after the Creation God brought the creatures to Adam 
that he might name them a . Now the first man, in his 
unimpaired state of corporeal, mental, and spiritual 
soundness, under the divine guidance, doubtless imposed 
upon them names significant of their qualities or struc- 
ture; which according to Plato was a work above human 
wisdom, and on account of which the ancient Hebrews 
deduced that Adam was a philosopher of the highest 
endowments b . Whether on this great and interesting 
occasion he gave names to individual species, or only to 
natural groups, does not clearly appear. But probably 
as they were created, so were they brought before him 
" According to their kinds c ." 
Subsequently Moses will be thought to have possessed 
no ordinary knowledge of insects, if we suppose, as the 
a Genes, ii. 19 — . b Pol. Synops. on Genes, ii. 
c Genes, i. 25. 
