The Life of Jean Henri Fabre 



lou dtforo d'uno moumno " (Man has the inside of 

 a pig and the outside of a monkey). I recommend 

 the painter's jest to those who wish to derive man 

 from the wild boar, when the monkey is out of 

 fashion. According to David the descent is con- 

 firmed by internal resemblances: ' L'home a lou 

 Jintre d'un por." 



And, therefore, the naturalist proceeds to 

 make some wise reflections which we owe in 

 the first place to Favier: 



Let us avoid generalisations that are not founded 

 upon sufficiently numerous and solid foundations. 

 Where these foundations are lacking the child is 

 the great generaliser. 



For him the feathered race means just the bird, 

 and the reptile family the snake, without other 

 differences than those of magnitude. Ignorant of 

 everything, he generalises to the utmost, simplify- 

 ing in his inability to see the complex. Later on 

 he will learn that the Sparrow is not the Bull- 

 finch, that the Linnet is not the Greenfinch; he will 

 particularise, and he will do so more and more 

 daily as his faculty of observation is more widely 

 exercised. At first he saw nothing but resem- 

 blances, now he sees differences, but not yet so 

 clearly as to avoid incongruous comparisons and 

 zoological solecisms like those which my gardener 

 utters. 1 



1 Souvenirs, IV., pp. 59-60. 



284 



