Bramble-bees and Others 



outset, otherwise the insect would have no 

 posterity. Time adds nothing to it and takes 

 nothing from it. Such as it was for a definite 

 species, such It Is to-day and such it will re- 

 main, perhaps the most settled zoological 

 characteristic of them all. It is not free nor 

 conscious in Its practice, any more than Is 

 the faculty of the stomach for digestion or 

 that of the heart for pulsation. The phases 

 of Its operations are predetermined, neces- 

 sarily entailed one by another; they suggest 

 a system of clock-work wherein one wheel set 

 in motion brings about the movement of the 

 next. This is the mechanical side of the In- 

 sect, the fatum, the only thing which Is able 

 to explain the monstrous illogicality of a 

 Pelopasus when misled by my artifices. Is the 

 Lamb when It first grips the teat a free and 

 conscious agent, capable of Improvement In 

 Its difficult art of taking nourishment? The 

 insect Is no more capable of improvement in 

 Its art, more difficult still, of giving nourish- 

 ment. 



But, with its hide-bound science ignorant of 

 Itself, pure instinct, if It stood alone, would 

 leave the insect unarmed in the perpetual con- 

 flict of circumstances. No two moments in 



194 



