The Life of Jean Henri Fabre 



indeed compelled absolutely to deny it any 

 such understanding. It does at once too 

 much and too little; too much for an insect's 

 intelligence and too little for any intelligence 

 whatever. Everything is against it; its 

 knowledge as much as its ignorance; its logic 

 as much as its inconsequences. 



So long as its circumstances are normal, the in- 

 sect's actions are calculated most rationally in view 

 of the object to be attained. What could be more 

 logical, for instance, than the devices employed by 

 the Hunting Wasp when paralysing her prey so 

 that it may keep fresh for her larva, while in no 

 wise imperilling that larva's safety? It is pre- 

 eminently rational ; we ourselves could think of 

 nothing better ; and yet the Wasp's action is not 

 prompted by reason. If she thought out her surg- 

 ery, she would be our superior. It will never oc- 

 cur to anybody that the creature is able, in the 

 smallest degree, to account for its skilful vivi- 

 sections. Therefore, so long as it does not depart 

 from the path mapped out for it, the insect can 

 perform the most sagacious actions without entitling 

 us in the least to attribute these to the dictates of 



reason. 1 



These acts of instinct, so scientifically de- 

 vised and so rationally performed by works 



1 Souvenirs, I., p. 220. The Hunting Wasps, chap, xiii, 

 " The Ammophila." 



348 



