APPARENT EXCEPTIONS. 197 



leaf. Can it be that this effect is itself produced 

 by a really similar cause — the eating of some lar- 

 val parasite into the tissue of the wing? If so, the 

 combination of means to the production of so won- 

 derful an effect becomes only the more bewilder- 

 ing in the endless vistas of adjustment which are 

 opened out. And there is another fact connected 

 with these insects which is as astonishing as any 

 other. It is this — that the idea and purpose of 

 imitation is carried into effect consistently and 

 perseveringly through all the stages of the crea- 

 ture's metamorphoses. The eggs are as perfect 

 imitations of vegetable seeds as the adult insect is 

 of the expanded leaf. In the larval form they 

 are like bits of stalk, or chips or cuttings of 

 leaves. 



But although the laws which determine both 

 form and colouring are here seen to be subservient 

 to use, we shall never understand the phenomena 

 of Nature unless we admit that mere ornament 

 or beauty is in itself a purpose, an object, and 

 an end. Mr Darwin denies this ; but he denies 

 it under the strange impression, that to admit it 

 would be absolutely fatal to his own theory on the 



