12 INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 



with very little violence be regarded as symbolical of 

 beings out of and above nature. The butterfly, adorned 

 with every beauty and every grace, borne by radiant 

 wings through the fields of ether, and extracting nectar 

 from every flower, gives us some idea of the blessed in- 

 habitants of happier worlds, of angels, and of the spirits 

 of the just arrived at their state of perfection. Again, 

 other insects seem emblematical of a different class of 

 unearthly beings : when we behold some tremendous for 

 the numerous horns and spines projecting in horrid 

 array from their head or shoulders ; others for their 

 threatening jaws of fearful length, and armed with cruel 

 fangs : when we survey the dismal hue and demoniac air 

 that distinguish others, the dens of darkness in which 

 they live, the impurity of their food, their predatory ha- 

 bits and cruelty, the nets which they spread, and the 

 pits which they sink to entrap the unwary, we can scarce- 

 ly help regarding them as aptly symbolizing evil demons, 

 the enemies of man, or of impure spirits for their vices 

 and crimes driven from the regions of light into dark- 

 ness and punishment a . 



The sight indeed of a well-stored cabinet of insects 

 will bring before every beholder not conversant with 

 them, forms in endless variety, which before he would 

 not have thought it possible could exist in nature, re- 

 sembling nothing that the other departments of the ani- 

 mal kingdom exhibit, and exceeding even the wildest 

 fictions of the most fertile imagination. Besides proto- 

 types of beauty and symmetry, there in miniature he will 



* This idea seems to have been present to the mind of Linne and 

 Fabricius, when they gave to insects such names as Belzebub, Belial, 

 Titan, Typhon, Nimrod, Geryon, and the like. 



