60 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 



entomologists — those who, not content with collecting and investigating 

 insects, occupy themselves in naming and describing such as have been 

 before unobserved ; in instituting new genera or reforming the old ; and, 

 to say all in one word, in perfecting the system of the science, — still 

 higher claims can be urged. Suppose that at this moment our dictionaries 

 of the French and German languages were so very defective, that we 

 were unable by the use of them to profit from the discoveries of their 

 philosophers ; the labors of a Michaelis being a sealed book to our theo- 

 logist, and those of La Place to our astronomers. On this supposition, 

 would not one of the most important literary undertakings be the compi- 

 lation of more perfect dictionaries, and would not the humblest contributor 

 to such an end be deemed most meritoriously engaged ? Now precisely 

 what an accurate dictionary of a particular language is towards enabling 

 the world to participate in the discoveries published in that language, is a 

 system of Entomology towards enabling mankind to derive advantage 

 from any discoveries relative to insects. A good system of insects, con- 

 taining all the known species arranged in appropriate genera, families, 

 orders and classes, is in fact a dictionary, putting it within our power to 

 ascertain the name of any given insect, and thus to learn what has been 

 observed respecting its properties and history, as readily as we determine 

 the meaning of a new word in a lexicon. In order to impress upon you 

 more forcibly the absolute need of such a system, I must enter into still 

 further detail. 



There is scarcely a country in which several thousand insects may not 

 be found. Now, without some scientific arrangem^t, how is the observer 

 of a new fact respecting any one of them to point out to distant countries, 

 and to posterity, the particular insect he had in view ? Suppose an observer 

 in England were to find a certain beetle which he had demonstrated to be a 

 specific for consumption ; and that it was necessary that this insect, which 

 there was reason to believe was common in every part of the world, should 

 be administered in a recent state. Would he not be anxious to proclaim the 

 happy discovery to sufferers in all quarters of the globe? As his reniedy 

 would not admit of transportation, he would have no other means than by 

 describing it. Now the question is, whether, on the supposition that no 

 system of Entomology existed, he would be able to do this, so as to be 

 intelligible to a physician in North America, for instance, eager to adminis- 

 ter so precious a medicine to his expiring patient ? It would evidently be 

 of no use to say that the specific was a beetle : there are thousands of 

 different beetles in North America. Nor would size or color be any 

 better guide : there are hundreds of beetles of the same size and the same 

 color. Even the plant on which it fed would be no sufficient clue ; for many 

 insects, resembling each other to an unpractised eye, feed on the same plant, 

 and the same insect in different countries feeds upon different plants. His 

 only resource, then, would be a colored figure and full description of it. 

 But every entomologist knows that there exist insects perfectly distinct, 

 yet so nearly resembling each other, that no engraving nor any language 

 other than that strictly scientific can possibly discriminate rfiem. After all, 

 therefore, the chances are that our discoverer's remedy, invaluable as it 

 might be, must be confined to his own immediate neighborhood, or to those 

 who came to receive personal information from him. But with what ease 



