12 LEPIDOPTEROLOGIE COMPAREE 



the Royal and rich for the means to meet cx[)cnses, or, it may 

 be, on a lengthy list of subscribers, the author is hère his own 

 patron, pnater, and publisher. M. Oberthiir's préfaces are indeed 

 most suggestive of eigliteenth-century methods. No ardent 

 disciple of the Darwinian nmeteenth century, he has no dealings 

 whatsoever with the materialism of tlie German scientists of the 

 twentieth centur)-. In his aloofness froin evolutionary and sélec- 

 tive spéculation he rescmbles his departed friend and colleague, 

 J. H. Fabre. Fabre introduces us to the ethics, the economy, the 

 manncrs, customs, and romance of insect society. He went to 

 Nature for his facts, and having founcl them, gave them to the 

 world clothed with the immortal beauty of leaves plucked from 

 the Tree of Knowledge. M. Oberthiir's concern is rather for the 

 aesthetics of his subjects, to sot forth the forms and fashions of 

 their variation m colour and design from the accepted norms, 

 leaving it to othcrs to embroider théories and reason conclusions 

 therefrom. 



In his Personal attitude IM. Oberthùr harks back even more 

 conspicuously on the fathers of entomology. Avoidmg contro- 

 versy himself, his conception of law and order in Nature is based 

 on revealed religion. At ail events he finds nothing in Nature 

 antagonistic to the scriptural account ot the Création : — 



Au cours de notre carrière entomologique déjà longue, non seulement 

 nous n'avons jamais trouvé de fait inconciliable avec la théorie de la 

 Création, mais nous avons rencontré un très grand nombre de faits 

 éminemment suggestifs et semblant inexplicables par toute autre concep- 

 tion métaphysique que celle d'un Dieu Créateur et d'un plan providentiel. 



This was written m a préface to one of the '" Etudes (VEnto- 

 liiologic " in i8q6; it is reechoed more than once in the présent 

 séries, rccalling the famous nineteen Observations which prélude 

 the " Systema Naturae " of Linneus : — 



Si opéra Dei intuemur, omnibus satis superque patet vivcntia singula 

 ex ovo propagari, omneque ovum producere subolem parenti simillimam. 

 Hinc nullae species novae hodicrnum producuntur — 



