The Life of the Bee 
the boundaries of instinct, without doing 
anything but what is ordinary, that would 
be very interesting too, and very extraor- 
dinary. Restore the ordinary and the 
marvellous to their veritable place in the 
bosom of nature, and their values shift ; 
one equals the other. We find that their 
names are usurped; and that it is not 
they, but the things we cannot under- 
stand or explain that should arrest our 
attention, refresh our activity, and give a 
new and juster form to our thoughts and 
feelings and words. There is wisdom in 
attaching oneself to nought beside. 
[ 111 ] 
And further, our intellect is not the 
proper tribunal before which to summon 
the bees, and pass their faults in review. 
Do we not find, among ourselves, that 
consciousness and intellect long will dwell 
in the midst of errors and faults without 
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