Microscopical Essays. 



™— " Mufe upon his fldll difplayed ; 



(Infinite fkill) in all that he has made ! 

 To trace in nature's mo ft minute delign, 

 The fignature and ft amp of pow'r divine ; 

 Contrivance intricate, exprefs'd with eafe 3 

 Where unafiifted fight no beauty fees ; 

 The fhapely limb, and lubricated joint, 

 Within the fmall dimenlions of a point j 

 Mufcle and nerve miraculoufly fpun, 

 His mighty work, who fpeaks and it is done, 

 Th' invifible in things fcarce feen reveal'd, 

 To whom an atom is an ample field. 

 To wonder at a thou land infect forms, 

 Thefe hatch'd, and thofe refufcitated worms, 

 New life ordain'd, and brighter fcenes to fhare, 

 Once prone on earth, now buoyant upon air. 5 '* 



The name of infecl has been appropriated to thefe fmall ani- 

 mals on account of the fe&ions or divifions in the bodies of the 

 greater number of them, from whence the parts feem to be 

 joined together by a kind of neck. It is perhaps impoftible to 

 find any general term that (hall embrace the whole genera of in- 

 fe&s, as many circumftances muft be defcribed before we can 

 attain an exaft notion of thefe animals and their conftitution. 



InfeBs are by moft writers confidered as divided into four 

 principal parts ; the caput or head, the thorax or trunk, the 

 abdomen or belly, and artus or limbs i a perfed knowledge of 



thefe 



* Cowper's Poems, vol. I. p. 261. 



