Instinct and Discernment 



separable from its nature, the qualities de- 

 manded by its craft: some which are invari- 

 able and belong to the province of instinct; 

 others which are flexible and belong to the 

 province of discernment. To divide a free 

 lodging into chambers by means of mud 

 partitions; to fill these chambers with a 

 heap of pollen-flour, with a few sups of 

 honey in the central part where the egg is to 

 lie; in short, to prepare board and lodging 

 for the unknown, for a family which the 

 mothers have never seen in the past and 

 will never see in the future: this, in its es- 

 sential features, is the function of the Os- 

 mia's instinct. Here, everything is har- 

 moniously, inflexibly, permanently preor- 

 dained; the insect has but to follow its blind 

 impulse to attain the goal. But the free 

 lodging offered by chance varies exceedingly 

 in hygienic conditions, in shape and in ca- 

 pacity. Instinct, which does not choose, 

 which does not contrive, would, if it were 

 alone, leave the insect's existence in peril. 

 To help her out of her predicament, in these 

 complex circumstances, the Osmia possesses 

 her little stock of discernment, which dis- 

 tinguishes between the dry and the wet, the 

 solid and the fragile, the sheltered and the 

 exposed; which recognizes the worth or 

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