the dark and foetid dunghill should in an instant entirely 

 change its form, rise into the blue air, and enjoy the sun- 

 beams — than a being whose pursuits liere have been after 

 an undying name, and whose purest happiness has been 

 derived from the acquisition of intellectual power and 

 finite knowledge, should rise hereafter into a state where 

 immortality is no longer a name, and ascend to the source 

 of unbounded power, and infinite wisdom." 



If any regard be paid to a similarity of names, it should 

 seem that the ancients were so struck with the transforma- 

 tions of the Butterfly, and its revival from a seeming 

 temporary death, as to have considered it as an emblem of 

 the soul ; the Greek word ^^X"! signifying both the soul 

 and a butterfly. This is also confirmed by their allegorical 

 sculptures, in which the Butterfly occurs as an emblem of 

 immortality. Nor is it very unlikely that the doctrine of 

 metempsychosis originated from the same source. What 

 ai'gument, by those who maintained tliis doctrine, would be 

 thought more plausible in favour of the transmigration of 

 souls, than the seeming revivification of the dead chrysalis. 



Swammerdam, speaking of tlie metamorjihosis of insects, 

 uses these strong words :_" this process is formed in so 

 remarkable a manner in Buttei-flies, that we see therein 

 the resurrection painted before our eyes, and exemplified 

 so as to be examined by our hands." 



