372 SYSTEM OF INSECTS. 



from the mouth ; and Acrita, in which this system is 

 molecular a . And to this division of the kingdom, as 

 founded on a satisfactory basis, I should recommend you 

 to adhere : still however we may speak of vertebrate and 

 invertebrate animals, as forming the primary subdivision 

 of them, taken from a striking character and obvious to 

 every one who sees them. 



If you inquire into the rank of each of these subking- 

 doms, of course you will assign the principal station to 

 the Vertebrates, which are the most perfectly organized, 

 to which man belongs, and over which he immediately 

 presides. If we form the scale according to the nervous 

 system of each province, that in which the organ of 

 sensation and intellect is most concentrated will stand 

 first ; and in proportion as this organ is multiplied and 

 dispersed will be the station of the rest, which will place 

 them in the order in which I have mentioned them ; and 

 the Aimulosa, to which insects belong, will precede the 

 Mollusca, which Cuvier and Lamarck had placed before 

 them on account of their system of circulation. But 

 when we reflect that a heart and circulation occur in some 

 of the conglomerate Polypi b , animals that approach the 

 vegetable kingdom ; that some of the acephalous Mollusca 

 have no visible organs of sense, except that of taste, 

 whose substance is little better than a homogeneous gela- 

 tinous pulp, and who seem from their inert nature to 

 have very slight powers of voluntary motion c , we shall 

 be convinced that a heart and circulation alone, unaccom- 

 panied by a more concentrated nervous system and more 



a Hor. Entomolog. 200. See above, p. 3. 



b Savigny Mem. sur les Anim. sans Vertlbr. II. \. 3. 



e MacLeay Hor. Ent. 204. 



