JV INTRODUCTION. 



in need of Bacon's* philosophy, which might be called common 

 sense systematized and refined, having for its object the finding 

 of facts, and tracing them to their roots, or from their roots 

 through their various ramifications ; which constitute the phil- 

 osophy of any question. I am well aware of the difficulties at- 

 tending the reception of new facts and ideas, which are apt to 

 bewilder and bore people whose judgments have never been 

 really cultivated. The general and sometimes almost involuntary 

 aversion to receive them is somewhat like the resistance made 

 to a suit at law to dispossess people of their properties, to say 

 nothing of the timidity of many to commit themselves to what 

 might be, or what might be held by the public to be, " vulgar 

 errors;" but that is presumed, by the "force of truth," sooner 

 or later to disappear. 



It is wonderful how much the Serpent is mixed up with the 

 Old and New Testament histories, and how little is known about 

 it ; and it would be remarkable if no meaning could be attached 

 to the Scriptural allusions to it, or that no interest should be felt 

 in regard to it. However odious the reptile is held to be, it 

 wonderfully rivets the attention of people meeting it, and it is 

 either timidly avoided or savagely killed. Many of them are 

 not only harmless, but of great Use to the farmer in clearing his 

 fields of mice and other vermin ; but some of the venomous 

 kinds are so dangerous, that a person bitten by them might as 

 well, in some instances, lay himself down and die, like a poisoned 

 rat in its hole. It is one of the mysteries of nature why some 

 snakes should be poisonous and others harmless, when the for- 

 mer could apparently serve the end for which it was created 

 without its venomous peculiarity. The leading traits in the 

 natural history of the Snake are incidentally illustrated in the 

 present Contributions. 



The Papers on Other Subjects were added after the above was 

 written. 



NEW YORK, ist September, 1874. 



