HISTORY OF ENTOMOLOGY. 465 
Entomology, however, in other respects was deeply 
indebted to this great man. He first, as was lately ob- 
served, directed the attention of her votaries to parts 
which enabled them better to follow the chain of affini- 
ties, and to trace out natural groups. In his Philosophia 
Entomologica, drawn up on the plan of Linne's Philoso- 
phia Botanica, he bequeathed to the science a standard 
work that ought to be studied by every Entomologist. 
His incredible labours in defining new genera and de- 
scribing new species, with which view he travelled into 
various parts of Europe, and seven times into Britain, 
have been of infinite service a , and placed the science 
upon a footing much nearer to that of Botany than it 
had ever before attained. 
6. Era of Latreille, or of the Eclectic System. The 
system of Fabricius, though generally adopted in Ger- 
many and Switzerland, did not meet with a universal re- 
ception. It seems to have gained no permanent footing 
in the North of Europe, Britain, or France. In the latter 
country the Linnean phraseology and characters of the 
Orders were retained by the celebrated Olivier; while at 
the same time his definitions of genera were construct- 
ed, after the Fabrician model, upon the antenna? and the 
oral organs. But a new and brilliant genius had now 
appeared in France, whose indefatigable labours and 
singular talents have thrown more light over entomolo- 
gical science than those of all his predecessors. In 1 796, 
about two years after Fabricius had completed his Ento- 
mologia Systematica emendata et aucta, M. Latreille pub- 
lished his Precis de Caracteres Generiques des Insectes • 
Fab. Enfomn/og. Sytt. em. et aurt. i. Praef. iv. 
VOL. IV. 2 If 
