H2 NOTES TO THE 



other. But this error is still more enormous ; with 

 gross blindness, or the most vague and licentious 

 imagination^ it disregards the boundaries which 

 nature has set between the animal and mineral 

 divisions of her works. 



Till this hypothesis arose, these sacred land- 

 marks had remained inviolate ; but now inert, life- 

 less matter, mere earth, is at once to be endowed 

 with all the properties and attributes of living, 

 animal bodies, — and all this without an agent or 

 a cause ! 



Whenever a disciple of the equivocal expedient 

 will show us an ascaris or an elephant, (for though 

 the examples differ, the labour will be the same,) 

 bred without parents, we will hold ourselves bound 

 to receive w hatever he may choose to advance on 

 the spontaneous production of animals. Till this 

 exhibition is made, those who reject the idea of 

 an effect without an adequate cause, as absurd 

 and unfounded, must be permitted to believe that 

 the generative .system of insects and worms is des- 

 tined to perform the same office which is assigned 

 to it in other living beings. 



It is true that every class of animals have their 

 peculiarities, insects certainly have many, especially 

 in their sexual organs and manner of propagation. 

 The two sexes of the same species are so extreme- 

 ly unlike each other that they would rather be ta- 

 ken for completely different species than for ani- 

 mals that could pair together. 



