412 Mr. W. S. MacLcay's Emminatitm of 



depth of your researches in this branch of Natural History, is your de- 

 claration, that Entomology is " a kingdom of nature," and that the Lin- 

 nean genus Scarabaeus is an insulated group, which it would be the 

 height of folly to subdivide ! There is some merit in making your debut 

 in a science with only two observations, and taking care that they should 

 be both original and new. Certainly the having proposed such two soli- 

 tary improvements, not only denotes your acquaintance with the subject, 

 but well entitles you to decide that " Entomology requires the most skil- 

 " ful arrangement to enable the student to determine the multitude of 

 " species," and that " it is, nevertheless, unquestionably the worst fur- 

 " nished with assistance in this way." This may, no doubt, be abstract- 

 edly quite correct ; but there is no one who lays down " first principles 

 " of arrangement" in Entomology, excepting yourself, who will consi- 

 der it to be the height of folly to subdivide a group like Scarabaeus, of 

 more than 2000 knovra species, and, in leaving the mass in chaotic con- 

 fusion, thereby think that he is giving the most skilful arrangement for 

 enabling the student to determine them. Were you indeed to take an- 

 other glance at two common English insects, viz. Cetonia aurata and 

 Trox sabulosus, I should not be surprized if you changed your opinion 

 as to the best mode of enabling the student to determine the species. 



I had long thought that there was but one natural system in the world, 

 and that every created being formed a part of it ; but you say, " Take 

 " any natural system, and see if there is not always a remainder of un- 

 " known things." But if the natural system be that of God, what is 

 meant by a remainder of unknown things } Not surely that He did not 

 understand the relations subsisting between the things He created. And 

 as to the Naturalists not understanding them, this only proves that we 

 have not yet attained the knowledge of the natural system, and much less 

 that of many of them. " We are constantly approximating to the truth, 

 " but never reaching it." At the same time it must be allowed, we are 

 sometimes too apt to forget that the real object of the Naturalist ought to 

 be to come as near the truth as possible, and that this is not to be done 

 by " abstract reasoning," so much as by observing and arranging facts. 



We next have rather a novel proposition started, to wit, that " the 

 " mammiferous animals are arranged with more ease, according to a 

 " natural system, (again as if there were more than one) in consequence 



