52 VERMES. 
to a great part of the creation, summons an host of the animal world into 
special notice, represented both in sacred and profane writings as utterly 
worthless, to be regarded with abhorrence, and fit to be destroyed with- 
out mercy. 
Mankind, the willing instruments of prejudice, and yielding to their 
destructive propensities, have avoided the investigation of many interest- 
ing phenomena of living nature, and have failed in the precepts of reason, 
as well as the moral principle of humanity, to inculcate the duty of pre- 
serving life. 
Have they heedlessly forgotten the will of the Diyme Author, who 
saw it good that they should be ? 
Opposed by discouragement so great, less surprise must be excited, 
when it appears that this ample division of the animal world has been 
neglected, and even despised. Few, indeed, cared for such beings, unless 
those who were superior to vulgar prejudices, or who, by penetrating a 
little farther into the history of some of these curious subjects, found 
inexhaustible sources of admiration. 
The mysterious origin and abode of worms in the human body, and 
in that of various animals, and their generation amidst decay and putres- 
cence, augmented the aversion entertained against them. Nor had the 
lights of science, until later eras, divulged the metamorphosis which many 
such loathsome creatures were destined to exhibit, as they passed into 
beautiful insects, decked in the gayest colours. 
Every modern naturalist is disposed to admit how little this parti- 
cular field has been cultivated—not from being unworthy of cultivation, 
but from being difficult, obscure, and neglected, insomuch, that scarcely 
more is known than some of the Linnean genera, and those proving 
noxious to the human frame. In all attempts at delineation, also, they 
are commonly exhibited after the rudest fashion, with a few exceptions, 
from the labours of the more accomplished authors. 
Let us reflect, however, on the obscurity of their abode, on their 
variable form, on their lability to perish, whereby even simple expo- 
sure to the light is often destructive. 
The absence of prominent parts renders it difficult to impose the 
