VERMES. 51 



CHAPTER II 



VERMES. 



NOTHING promotes the advance of learning equally as approbation 

 and encouragement. Nor can the ardent student of Nature receive a 

 more chilling reproof, than by finding the subjects of his predilection 

 treated with contempt. 



If the Author of the Universe deemed the whole animal portion of 

 it worthy of creation, how can that production exist which may be ra- 

 tionally despised of man ? 



But ignorance, prejudice, or presumption, are too ready to attach 

 qualities to mere external aspect, to deny properties unseen, or to deride 

 as worthless what they do not comprehend. 



Yet true it is, that the rarest virtues often lurk unseen, whence 

 the earliest duty of the wise, the liberal, and the just, is to probe diligently 

 and deeply those marvellous works of Nature continually exhibited to 

 our half-frozen senses. 



It was peculiarly unfortunate that so distinguished an author as 

 Linnaeus, a naturalist of the highest order, and the first who founded an 

 improveable system, should have comprehended an immense class of ani- 

 mated productions under the general denomination of Worms. Not only 

 does it include a vast variety of living beings void of any common fea- 

 tures appreciable by ordinary observation, whether in relation to form 

 or habits, but because the appellation Worms, however justly applicable 



