90 NATURAL HISTORY 



Burke was undoubtedly a great man, but he 

 made a great mistake when he said that " our 

 ignorance of nature is the cause of. all our admira- 

 tion." If he had said that our ignorance is the 

 cause of all our exclamations, it would have been 

 near the truth. Give to the naturalist his micro- 

 scope, and let him see new beauties in the wing of 

 an insect or the veins of a leaf that he never saw 

 before, and you hear him. exclaiming as others 

 do when they look upon beauties that he has seen 

 hundreds of times. Our exclamations are not signs 

 that we see or appreciate the beauties of nature 

 more than others, but simply that we see them now 

 for the first time. 



Wander, then, through beautiful cabinets, and 

 each day they will become more beautiful ; go out 

 into the fields and study with care every object 

 there, and you will be astonished at the beauties 

 which God has scattered with such a liberal hand, 

 that scarcely a place can be found where some 

 have not fallen, though unperceived by the hurry- 

 ing multitude. 



