32 SUPPLEMENT ON 



and especially those operations to which our ignorance has 

 given the name of instinctive, but which, whatever be their 

 cause, are so superior in precision and completeness of result, 

 to those originated by human reason ; their attentive cares 

 for the preservation of the species ; and, finally, the destruc- 

 tive action which numbers of them exercise on our properties 

 or ourselves, and the important advantages which we derive 

 from so many others. 



If time and space permitted us, we might enlarge on the 

 advantages which man has derived, and may yet derive, from 

 the study of the insect tribes. We might notice that the 

 idea of many of the most useful and necessary arts, have been 

 owing even to a superficial observation of this class of ani- 

 mals, and their curious operations. We might remark, that 

 many superstitious and vulgar prejudices have been dissipated 

 by an extended knowledge of their species and peculiarities, 

 and that our notions on natviral science have been rectified by 

 the same cause. The last mentioned particular is well 

 deserving of attention. Before Redi, Malpighi, Swammer- 

 dam, and Reaumur had pursued their invaluable researches 

 on the animals in question, many operations of nature in 

 general, were most grossly misunderstood. The absurd 

 theory, for instance, of equivocal generation^ from which 

 other absurdities were questionless derived, was overturned 

 by the attention given to this part of insect physiology by 

 the illustrious observers just cited. There can be little doubt 

 that the opinion of the ancients, that insects sprung from the 

 corruption of material substances, retarded, for a long time, 

 the progress of entomological science. When it was believed 

 that they were thus produced, it naturally followed that the 

 most curious part of their history, all that appertaining to a 

 perpetuation of their species, must be neglected and un- 

 known. The case was similar respecting the transformations 

 of insects, as long as it was supposed that they were any 



